Brave New Hope
by AnneRG
Summary: After surviving the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, Sirius and Mia Black need to deal with the second war against Voldemort at the same time they fight to keep their family safe, including their godson, Harry Potter. Sequel to 'Brave New World'.
1. Prophecy

**Title: **Brave New Hope

**Author:** AnneRG

**Spoilers:** Through HBP and DH

**Pairings:** Sirius/OC, Harry/Ginny, Remus/Tonks, others.

**Rating:** T

**Warning: **Read the prequels, 'Finding Our Way' and 'Brave New World', first

**Disclaimer:** Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling. If it belonged to me, I'd be very, very rich…

**Summary:** After surviving the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, Sirius and Mia Black need to deal with the second war against Voldemort at the same time they fight to keep their family safe, including their godson, Harry Potter. Sequel to '_Brave New World'._

**December 1980, London**

"What do we do, James? How do we protect him from this?" Lily Potter whispered as she and her husband stood in the dark in their son's nursery, watching the infant sleep in his cot.

He shook his head. "I don't know, Lils," James murmured. They'd both been caught by surprise when Dumbledore had told them that Voldemort might be after their son. At first, they didn't want to believe it – why, of all people, would a dark lard see a four-month-old baby as a threat? Why _their_ baby?

Then, the headmaster had explained. It was a prophecy, made over a year ago, that stated that a baby born in the end of the seventh month to parents that had been face-to-face with Voldemort twice would be the one with the power to defeat him. I could either be Harry or Frank and Alice's boy, Neville.

Lily reached down to pick her son from his cot, feeling a sudden urge to hold him closely. The baby stirred a bit and let out a protesting whimper when he was disturbed in his sleep but quickly settled down, feeling himself in the comfort of his mother's arms. "It can't be him, James," she said, looking up at him watery eyes. "He's so small…"

"It's not fair," he stated. _Not fair for Harry or for the Neville_, he thought. They were both small, they were both innocent and one them had his fate written in stone already. He felt especially sorry for the other boy – his parents had been caught, Dumbledore had told them. There still wasn't a sign of Frank or Alice yet but, as it had been Bellatrix Lestrange's doing, nothing good could come out of it. He felt chills because, just a couple of days before, Lily had mentioned she thought she'd been followed when she'd gone out of the house to visit Sirius and Mia, who lived just half a dozen blocks away.

"_It is safer if you all go into hiding,"_ the headmaster had stated. _"To protect yourselves and your son. Professor Flitwick has agreed to teach you how to cast the Fidelius Charm, Lily, to keep your location secured. All you'll need is a trustworthy secret keeper."_

Part of him wanted to stay behind and fight but he wasn't about to risk his son's life for it. _Family comes first, pride comes later_, his father had always said. "We should go, Lils," he told his wife. "We'll be safer hiding, Harry will be safer. We're his parents – we'll do whatever we have to in order to protect him or, though I'm hoping we won't get to that, we'll die trying. That son of a bitch won't touch a single hair of my son's head if I have anything to say about it."

"I don't want to lose him, James," Lily murmured, rocking the baby.

He reached for her face, wiping the tears running down her cheeks. "We won't," he promised and, then, made an effort to give her a smile and reassure her. This time, he'd have to be the strong one. "I'll get one of the guys to be our secret-keeper. Well be safe."

She nodded, letting out a still unsteady breath before looking down at her son. So peaceful, sleeping in his Quidditch-themed sleepsuit, his face flushed from the slumber. She reached down to place a kiss on his forehead, a curtain of bright red hair falling around her face as she did it. "We won't let anyone hurt you, my little angel," she murmured against the baby's warm skin.

This time, James did mean it when he smiled again, proud of Lily and himself. They might be young but they were good parents. She looked up at him, her eyes still red but now confident. "It's a promise," he told her as his hand touched her arm. "We should pack – I'll tell Dumbledore we're leaving tomorrow."

* * *

**Present time**

If five years before some random bloke had told Sirius Black that he would be a family man with Mia Davis by his side, he might have bitterly told him to go mock somebody else. He dreamed of it back then, honestly, he did. But being locked up in Azkaban made one faithless sometimes… most of the time, actually. It made any idea of happiness sound like a distant dream. Yet, things had turned out just that way: he was a family man with three children and another on the way with Mia Davis, now Black, as his wife.

And again, if merely a month ago some random bloke had told him that Harry Potter, who for him was no boy-who-lived but just the kid who was as good as his son, had the destiny of either killing or be killed by Voldemort, he would have certainly told him to piss off or he'd seriously considering using his wand to make them. Yet, it was the world's cruel truth.

"_The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches.…born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies…and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not.…and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives.…the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies…"_

The words were more than clear on themselves and he'd not only heard them from Dumbledore's mouth but also from Sybill Trelawney's in his pensieve memory. It sounded cruel, cold, and part of Sirius wanted to yell that Trelawney was just full of crap. But he couldn't because, deep down, he knew it was completely true. Things made so much sense now: why Voldemort had always been after Harry, why there was a connection between them…

"Padfoot, focus," Remus whispered after elbowing him on the ribs, awakening Sirius from his thoughts. He saw himself back in the main room of the Order's headquarters in the basement of the house where Lily and James had lived with Harry before they'd needed to go into hiding to Godric's Hallow, where the headmaster was holding an order meeting, concerning the new strategies that the order was to adapt, now that the ministry had recognized Voldemort's return and would be helping them fight him. As much as it might interest him, lately talking about the snake-faced bastard tended to make his mind drift back to the most recent burden that had been placed upon his godson's shoulders: the prophecy.

It had been a week since he and Mia had learned of it and six days since they'd told Harry about it, making the whole thing was still fresh. Still, for the sake of his sanity, Sirius had, along with Mia, been following Dumbledore's advice and tried not to over-think it and just go on with his life.

As for Harry, his initial reaction had been of mixed disbelief and anger, as expected. What young boy who was told he either had to kill and to be killed wouldn't be angry? However, after Sirius and Mia's reassurance and the promise by Dumbledore that he'd personally make sure Harry was prepared for when the ultimate time came, had helped the young boy starting to cope – last time Sirius had seen him, just that morning, as scared as he might be by the fate that seemed to have been assigned to him, the kid was holding strong on his feet like the fighter he was.

"Not very focused today, are you, Sirius?" Remus asked him, several minutes later just as the meeting had reached an end.

"Got a lot of stuff in my mind," Sirius told him. He didn't specify what, as he and Mia had still not shared the prophecy with anyone but Harry. He knew they'd tell Moony at some point but, for now, they were still trying to digest it themselves.

"You and Mia are not at odds again, are you?" his friend asked, worried.

Sirius frowned immediately. "What? No, of course not. We're okay, Moony. Great, actually," Sirius stated. In fact, his relationship with Mia seemed to have been strengthened since their rough patch – he wasn't sure if it was due to their near-death experiences or to the fact that the fight had reminded them of how miserable they felt when they were apart. Maybe it was both. "I'm just worried about Harry, that's all. Everything seems to fall on his shoulders," he said truthfully, not wanting to leave his friend hanging with the doubt.

The werewolf nodded, though he had a feeling that Sirius wasn't telling him everything. Still, being his friend for such a long time, he trusted Sirius would tell him whatever was going on with time.

Sirius sighed and tried to keep those thought about the prophecy out of his head. Better change the subject, then. "So, are you going to see Tonks at St. Mungo's today?"

"I'm not planning to," Remus stated, dismissively. Every day, he told himself he wouldn't go. Dora was fine, she didn't need him there, even if she certainly wanted him, and going only made things harder for him. Yet, he always ended up doing it, to his own frustration – the woman just wouldn't leave his head and he couldn't bring himself to pull back… He knew he was getting himself hooked to her and, at some point, he wouldn't be able to pull back. It already felt harder to stay away now, scared as he'd been when she'd gotten herself cursed.

"Do you know when they're letting her go back home?" Sirius asked.

"Tomorrow," Remus stated. "Her parents were there yesterday – Andromeda says 'hi', by the way – and they were trying to convince her to go home with them and spend a couple of weeks there until she had to go back to work. She said she'd be fine in her own flat." He paused, unsure if he should tell the rest, knowing Sirius should make a big deal out of it. Still, he thought he'd go mad if he didn't tell it to anyone… "She asked me if I wanted to go to her flat with her after they left. Go to her flat and stay there… for a while."

Sirius's face lit up and he grinned. "Interesting. And what did you say?"

"I said I'd think of it."

"Hum, no immediate refusal, even more interesting. Shall I drop by later to help you pack?" he inquired playfully.

"Cut it out, Padfoot," the werewolf told him, looking away in embarrassment. "Just because I said I'd think of it, doesn't mean I'll go."

"Yeah and just because you keep saying you won't visit her at the hospital every day, that doesn't keep you from always doing it," Sirius replied. "Just accept that there's no use fighting it – you got it bad, mate. A little colour in your life would make wonders to your moods."

"It's not fair to her."

"Not fair? She's the one who wants you to go home with her and, if I recall it well, she's of-age, doesn't have any sort of mental illnesses, is aware of your condition and doesn't give a damn about it. The only thing that's unfair in the middle of all this is that you won't trust her judgement, so take my advice and get your head out of your arse. Now, I'm going home to my woman, I'll kiss her and tell her that I love her." He patted his friend on the back. "You should do the same, Moony. It's one hell of a feeling."

And, as he watched his best friend leave, Remus felt tempted to do what he'd just said. He let out a sigh and leaned against the back of his chair. Why couldn't things be just a little bit easier?

Sirius peaked through the master bedroom's door and half-chuckled as he saw Mia sitting up on bed, her dark brown hair falling messily over her shoulders and face, unsuccessfully trying to keep a thick book open with a single hand as her other arm was still secured by the sling Madam Pomfrey and Elizabeth had made her wear until her shoulder was healed, which might still take at least another week. Other than that and a still unsteady knee, she was practically fully healed from all the injuries she'd gotten.

Mia cursed under her breath and just gave up, closing the book and putting it on her bedside table. That was when she noticed her husband there. "I'm bored," she moaned, making him chuckle some more. "Oh, and this amuses you. That's nice," she said sarcastically.

He took a seat on the edge of the bed. "Shame on me," he said before leaning to her and kissing her lips softly as a way of saying 'hello'. It was her mouth that deepened it but he didn't hesitate in following her. There was that newly enlightened passion he'd been thinking about. His hand cupped her cheek, feeling the warmth of it against his palm as his lips moved against hers. He wondered if it would ever end – those little shocks that kissing her tended to cause in his spine, the warmth it brought to his body… They pulled away after a few seconds and he grinned. "Sill bored?"

"Hum… I don't think so," she replied.

His hand descended from her face to touch her shoulder softly enough not to make it hurt. "Well, apart from the boredom, how has my wife been feeling since I left?"

"A little achy from being in bed all the time. But other than that and this stupid sling that only gets in the way of everything, I feel fine," she said. "I got up for a few minutes and the knee feels much better now."

"Hum, that's good. And what about my baby?" He placed a hand on her flat stomach, foolishly hoping for his unborn child to give him a sign of being there, despite knowing well enough he or she was still too small to so such a thing.

She smiled warmly. "Your baby must be feeling just great, probably napping all the time in there. I cast the charm to hear the heartbeat earlier and it sounded just normal." Mia sighed and covered his hand with her own. "It still feels a bit unreal nothing bad happened to him or her after my little adventure in the Department of Mysteries."

He fought back a shiver at the mention of the place – as far as he was concerned, he didn't want to hear of it at all for the rest of his life. "Our baby is a strong little one," he replied, making an effort to not to think of the bad memories. "What do you think we're having? Boy? Girl? One of each?"

"Well, I can tell you for sure there's only one in there," Mia replied. "As for boy or girl, I think I want to be surprised this time around. Don't you?"

He shrugged. "As long it's healthy, I wouldn't mind a surprise. And speaking of kids, Harry and Izzy asked me to say 'hi' to you," he told her.

"You saw them?" Mia asked, surprised.

He nodded. "I dropped by Hogwarts before going to the meeting. Dumbledore had asked me if I could go unseal Umbridge's office so he could kick her out of the school for good, remember?"

"Ah, and how did it go?" Mia asked in amusement.

He sighed. "Well, we were all shocked to find out that there was a couple of nifflers locked in there with her things all those months – they seemed to have fed on her lovely plants… But seriously, it wasn't me who put it there – I think it may have been Fred and George before I sealed the office. Anyway, Dolores-dearest is out and we're back in – Dumbledore asked me to tell you that he will arrange for someone to replace you during your maternity leave, unless you're planning to keep on going back to work just after the baby is born."

"Hum, as much as I love teaching, I think my hands will be quite full at the time. But tell me how Harry was. Did he look okay? Did he say anything about the prophecy?"

Sirius nodded. "He sounded fine – the kid has been coping with it. He told Ginny about the prophecy and she's been there to help him deal with it. He says he'll tell Ron, Hermione and Izzy about it once he figures things out himself, so I'd say he's doing as well as someone in his situation can."

Mia sighed. "Thank Merlin." She'd been so worried… at this point more worried about his reaction than to his fate. Knowing he was on his way to acceptance, settled her down by a lot – truth was, she'd taken her own conclusions about the matter. "I've been thinking about this, you know? About this prophecy. And I realized a thing."

"What?" he inquired, curious.

"It's not completely bad. I mean, yes, it's terrible that Harry's condemned to face Voldemort in the end. It's too much for as a young boy to deal with. Still, he's been a marked boy for years and we had no idea why before. Now, we do: Voldemort's afraid of Harry. Deep down, he'd terrified of him, or else he wouldn't have been so keen to attack him. And now, because of this prophecy, we know Harry has a shot at winning this war. Because he has something Voldemort doesn't… he has love. He feels it, he understands it and he doesn't underestimate it. That makes him stronger."

Her word showed she'd thought way father than he had – he supposed it had to do with being stuck in bed with nothing else to do. She'd processed the whole thing and probably managed to find the one thing that could some from that prophecy. "You're right," he agreed. "Harry will be fighting for himself and all of us – Voldemort will just be fighting for himself."

"So, this prophecy… it doesn't just bring despair. It brings hope," she stated, positively. "Now we know that if we do things right, if love is enough, one day this will be over and Harry will live through all of it. We know we can all have a future."

He smiled and leaned closer to her and kissed her lips lightly. Mia had always had a gift to give him peace when he needed it, now more than ever. When he pulled a few inches back, he gave her his hand. "Fancy a visit downstairs, Madam? I think I heard a certain toddler down there raising some hell. He goes by the name of 'Alex, the destroyer' and he seems to have a soft spot for his mummy and cookies."

Her lips curled. "I wonder who that might be," she replied in amusement. "But actually…" Mia bit her lower lip. "I was thinking of doing something else first." Her good hand pulled him further to her and her lips touched his again, with such fierce and passion, clearly making an invitation.

Sirius was a little hesitant in accepting it, though. "Wait, are you sure you can… are you sure it won't… hurt you?"

"Elizabeth said I was good to go as far as she was concerned," Mia whispered. "As for the rest, I know you'll be careful not to hurt me… It's been nearly two weeks and we haven't made love since before the fight. I need you now. Please."

Her pleading was enough to convince him and, s his moth captured hers again, they kissed passionately for several seconds without pulling away for air. He helped her taking off the sling just for the moment before she lied back and they resumed kissing in a more horizontal fashion.

"I did miss this," he confessed against her lips after a few minutes, making her laugh.

And, as they took the passion further, he realized something. He didn't need a prophecy to give him new hope. He knew that, as long as he had Mia, as long as he had his family, there would always be a chance for a better future.

**A/N: Well, with this we jump into another volume, which will pretty much continue straight from where 'Brave New World' left us. It will mostly separate the Before and After the battle of the department of mysteries (not to mention that it will helps me a lot to reorganize my mind). I honestly hope you liked it. Feedback is love :D Review!**


	2. In the Platform

**A/N: Sorry for the little delay but I got the flu this week, so it was sort of complicated to write...**

**Grimmauld Place, ****28 June 1996**

The last Friday of June brought along the last day of term at Hogwarts and the time for Izzy and Harry to come back home for their Summer Break.

For the first time in their lives, Sirius and Mia weren't sure if they should be happy or worried about it. On the one hand, they were obviously excited to have all their children nearby again as the house clearly wasn't the same without them; on the other hand, they couldn't help feeling a bit uneasy because they knew the kids were a lot safer at Hogwarts: there, they could go out of the castle and still be protected by the wards… at home, however, if they left the house, there was nothing to protect them except for themselves. That was one of the many dangers during war-time – whenever people came out of their places, they couldn't know if they'd make it back in. And even though no attacks had occurred within the wizarding community yet, that fear certainly was hovering over everyone's heads now more than ever.

As he thought about that, Sirius sighed with his eyes closed and felt a hand softly touching his face, making him open one eye to see Mia looking down at him, her left arm now sling-free. He was lounging on the living room couch, his head lazily resting on his wife's lap as they waited for the time to pick up Harry and Izzy to arrive. Sirius got hold of her hand and brought it closer to his lips, kissing the back of it.

"You look thoughtful. Care to share?" she asked, smiling down lightly, with the sound of the Muggle telly broadcasting the news of the day in the background. They weren't really watching it at the moment, they just had it on so there wouldn't be complete silence in the background…

"Depressive stuff," Sirius stated with a huff.

"Do you want to be more specific?"

He shrugged. "I was trying to figure out how we'll manage the kids this Summer with the war… it feels like everything outside of this house will become a battlefield."

"I know," she whispered. "But we can't keep them locked in. I wish we could so they'd be safe but…"

"It wouldn't be fair," Sirius stated. "Merlin, this sucks."

Mia let out a breath and softly touched his hair in a soothing manner. Suddenly, the voices on the telly caught her attention and she turned to watch it – the news anchor was announcing the suspicious death of twelve people in the streets of London in the past two weeks.

"… _the police suspects that a serial killer is responsible for all these deaths, though no sign of trauma or poisoning was found in any of the bodies. Dr. Martin Brown from the Forensic Sciences Service is here to give us his judgment in this matter. Good Afternoon, Dr.…"_

"I'd bet all the gold I have that it is Death Eater's doing," Sirius said, motioning to sit up on the sofa.

Mia nodded. "They're only attacking Muggles so far."

"Yeah. Because they want to send us a message: nobody in and out of the wizarding world is safe. Like we don't bloody know it already."

Mia reached for him and wrapped one arm around his back as she rested her head on his shoulder. "They can't even defend themselves against something they don't even know that exists."

"It's sick," he agreed, taking a deep breath.

This time, he was the one rubbing her long, silky brown hair and pressing a kiss to the top of her head. It was affecting her, the deaths. Last time around, that was the way it had all started – random deaths. Sirius immediately regretted mentioning that. He knew that as much as she tried to cling to the hope she'd managed to get from the prophecy, there was only so much it could hold. And the last thing he wanted was for her to be under more stress than she needed, especially while carrying his child. He felt tempted to just get rid of the Muggle telly, knowing hearing the news from there was bothering her further but, knowing she'd probably call him an overprotective git over it and get her knickers in a twist, he simply turned it off using the remote.

"Let's not think of this stuff, okay?" he suggested gently as she pulled away from his hold a little, to get a better look at him. "The kids are coming back home today, I'd rather welcome them grinning instead of moping."

Mia smiled a little at the mention of them. "You're right. We should make things normal for them. Or as normal as possible." It wasn't easy being a parent during wartime. She let out a sigh and forced herself to get in a better mood for their sake and, partly, her own as well. "Have you thought what you'll say if, by any chance, we get to meet Izzy's boyfriend today?" she asked, casually.

He groaned. "Please, don't remind me. Couldn't she just stay away from boys for one or two more years?"

She raised an eyebrow. "I believe you started snogging girls and going out with them when you turned thirteen. She's one year older that you were, if my math is correct."

"Well, I didn't call any of them my 'girlfriend', did I?"

"And that's supposed to be something on your favour?" Mia asked sceptically. "Look, at least she's just sticking with one boy and, from what I've gathered, the best adjectives she has to describe are 'nice' and 'sweet'. It's just a little teenage fling." She looked at him and nearly laughed when she found him pouting like a little kid.

"I still don't like it," Sirius mumbled stubbornly.

His wife huffed. "Look, let's put it like this: if you act like an arse to Terry, she'll be hurt and angry at you. Do you want that to happen?"

"Of course I don't," he replied. "It's just… she's our first baby. It's hard to let go."

Mia felt a little sympathetic and rested a hand on his shoulder. "You won't have to let go of her anytime soon. She's fourteen and has a boyfriend, not twenty and getting married. Believe me, Izzy is still very far from leaving the nest."

_So, I may be dramatizing it a little too much…_ Sirius accepted. Well, he had the right, hadn't he? Two years of experience as a father and having a daughter already dating was quite a complicated match. He supposed he hadn't had that problem with Harry because he was very aware of what went through a boy's mind at that age in terms of girls and he knew and liked Ginny Weasley. A teenage girl's mind, however, was rather mysterious to him, not to mention that he had no idea what sort of guy Terry Boot was. He supposed he couldn't be that bad or else she wouldn't be dating him. Plus, Harry would have said something if Boot was a git. "I suppose I can give her a little credit," he mumbled.

"Good," she said, victorious. "You're not the only one who gets a sort of clueless with them growing up, Sirius. To me, it seems like it was yesterday that they were little kids asking for cuddling."

Sirius sighed. "Well, at least Alex is still in cuddling age," he offered. "That's good."

"Yes, and so will be the baby on the way," Mia pointed out, smiling.

He smiled back and didn't resist resting a hand on her flat abdomen. The poor kid was probably as small as fig at the moment. Mia wasn't three months along yet, and, apart from her clothes seeming slightly tighter on her and that glow that she seemed to have, one could barely tell she was pregnant so far. Yet, he always thought of it, every time he looked at her. With the matter of Izzy's boyfriend forgotten, he looked up at Mia and smiled. "Have I mentioned you look even more beautiful when you're having my baby?"

Mia smiled. "I supposed you've said it once or twice already," she said. "Keep that in your mind when I'm too big to sleep on my stomach."

"Why would I need to? You're still beautiful when you're too big to sleep on your stomach, love," he told her, faking confusion. "More of you to love."

"Well, aren't you the flatterer, Mr. Black?" she asked, smiling at him as her hand reached up to his face. "Kiss me?"

"If you insist," he said before wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her firmly to him, joining their mouths with fierce.

She let out a moan against his lips and, let herself enjoy. Kissing him was an indulgence she just couldn't give up, not even before the two of them had started dating, although it hurt her back then knowing he wasn't all hers. Teenage minds, afraid to give it all and ruin it all had made them deny their feelings until they'd finally come clean in their seventeenth birthday and started what had bloomed into what they were today. A unit.

After he stranded her under his body, carefully not to crush her with his weight, his lips left hers to tease her jaw, her neck and the bridge that led to her shoulder, making her grip on his side grow stronger. She was nearly lost by the time his lips made their way back to hers but a little voice in the back of her head reminded her that they had other things to do. "Sirius," she managed to say, her voice muffled by his mouth. "We don't have…" he interrupted her with another kiss, which she couldn't help responding "… time for this."

"Hum?" he mumbled, pulling away, a bit confused.

"The kids. We've got to pick them up from the train in…" she reached for his arm and pulled it to her in order to check his watch as she wasn't wearing one at the moment "… twenty minutes. And there's also Alex – he'll be waking up from his nap at any minute."

Sirius groaned. "Can't time just take a break until we're done?"

"I don't think that's really possible." She kissed his cheek as they sat back up. Mia herself felt a little frustrated with the need to stop. Those pregnancy hormones were starting to get to her in what came to moods and… other sorts of moods, tightly related to Sirius, obviously. "There's always tonight," she said, giving him a smile, "with no interruptions then."

"You can bet I'll take you up on that," he warned her, getting up and offering her his hand to pull her up too, which she accepted. "Come on, the sooner we get the kids home, the sooner we'll find an excuse to get ourselves in our room all alone."

* * *

Going to Platform 9 ¾ – now with aurors all over it for everyone's protection – on the days that were marked as the beginning or end of an year at Hogwarts was always an opportunity to run into several old friends, acquaintances or good old foes. Still, as for the latter option, it was safe to say that the odds of it happening had been severely reduced for the simple fact that many of the mentioned foes had been sent to Azkaban, following their altercation at the Department of Mysteries.

Consequently, it was very easy to spot a group of Death Eaters' wives – without their respective husbands – standing in the shadows waiting for the train to arrive with their children. Narcissa Malfoy didn't keep herself from shooting Sirius her best glare in the moment she stepped into the platform and headed to meet the other Mrs. Death Eaters. Amused with his cousin's rage, Sirius waved at her with a grin all over his face, making Narcissa turned her face away.

"Ah, always lovely to see family, isn't it?" he told Mia, sarcastically. "Should we go there and say 'hi'?"

Mia gave him a cautious look as she held her son, who looked fascinated by all the people around, by the hand. "Let's not strike the beehive, especially not when we have a toddler around," she warned him. "It's not a secret Narcissa has a mean temper and no scruples whatsoever."

He shrugged. "I suppose being cursed would ruin the fun of mocking her, after all…"

On the floor, little Alex started to pull his father's leg in order to get his attention. "Up, Daddy!"

Sirius chuckled and granted his son's wish, scooping him up and holding him in his arms. "There you go, mate. I suppose you'll get a better look at girls from up here," he told his son mischievously. "But I don't think there are many girls with your age around here."

"Don't start giving him ideas already, Sirius," Mia said, rolling her eyes before she reached for her son and kissed his soft, rosy cheek. "Here, let me take him for a while." She'd missed being able to carry him while her shoulder was useless and her arm was contained in a sling.

Sirius looked hesitant. "Are you sure you…" He stopped talking when she gave him a don't-even-try look and just passed her the baby, whom she shifted to carry on her hip.

The little boy immediately resumed looking around, amazed with all the people, pointing every now and then and calling for their attention.

While Mia was entertaining her son by walking around with him, her eyes reached the entrance of the platform and she frowned at the sight. "What is _she_ doing here?"

Sirius turned around to look at the entrance too and was displeased to find one Barbara Lasher – in their Hogwarts days, a Slytherin prefect, Head Girl wannabe, having been beaten there by Lily, and head pain in the arse – making her way into the platform. "Probably has a kid in the school. Moony and I spotted her here back in September too…" he said quickly. "Blimey, don't look right at her – she'll spot us with her bat radar and we'll never get rid of her."

"Too late, she's already heading this way," Mia said under her breath, clutching her son closer as the woman approached.

"The Blacks! I just can't believe it!"

Her voice had a high-pitched tone that was almost painful to hear. That was just one of the many reasons to despise her. She was exceedingly pretty, too pretty to be natural, all perky features and tumbling coal-black hair. Last time Sirius and Mia had counted, she'd married well four times, become widowed once and gotten separated three times. All of that summed, Barbara was the owner of a very fat Gringotts vault.

She spared them a painfully fake smile and her eyes landed on Alex. "Oh, and a baby. How delightful. Looks just like his father." She reached to pat the baby's cheek but he was faster and hid his little face against his mother's neck, clearly uncomfortable with Barbara's presence. "Oh, well, not very social."

"Must be the company" Mia replied coldly, rubbing her son's back

Barbara ignored her words. "I saw you and just couldn't resist dropping by to say 'hello'," she told them, who deeply wished she _had_ resisted and stayed as far away as it was possible. The woman turned to Sirius and smiled. "I heard you were innocent, of course. I've been meaning to call, but I've been so busy." She let out a clearly fake sigh. "All those terrible stories." Delighted malice flitted around her magically engorged lips. "Why it must have been just dreadful for you. I just can't imagine the terror of spending such a long time in prison."

He narrowed his eyes – well, wasn't it obvious the bloody snake had come around to bite them a little bit? Hadn't changed a thing since school… unless maybe having grown meaner. "Well, it was no five-star hotel," he said, not presenting her with the sorrow she'd been hoping for.

"I assume you are here to pick up your children," Mia said, trying to distract her from the subject.

"Just my daughter," Barbara corrected. "Romilda started her first year at the same time Sirius here escaped from that _awful_ prison. I'll have to confess I found it awful that Patterson was the one to commit those crimes…"

"Pettigrew," Mia corrected.

"…such good friends you all were. A simple lack of judgement – happens to anyone."

She just can't keep her mouth shut, can she? Sirius thought, deciding he was done with the pleasantries. "Even to you, apparently. Three ex-husbands. Isn't that quite a string of lack of judgement? Unless, of course, dumping them was the plan."

"Oh, what a ridiculous thing to say," she said sharply.

"Yes, just plain silly. Now, Babs, I've just remembered the most hilarious thing. Do you remember that time you got a terrible case of hives after badmouthing Mia?" He glanced at his wife and saw her lips curling – she hadn't forgotten it at all.

Barbara's eyes narrowed and she dropped the mask. "I _knew_ it was you, but Dumbledore wouldn't believe me. Brainless old berk."

"Actually it was James but only because I lost the draw. It was my idea. Now would you like to leave quietly, or should I get my wand and send you out of here bicoloured and hysterical again?"

Her face was red with fury and her hands clutched so tightly into fists that Sirius bet those sharp nails of hers would break through skin… that was, if she didn't lunge forward to pierce them through _him_. "You were always nothing but a second-grade scallywag who managed to get himself kicked out of his own family!" she hissed, turning on her heels and, to their delight, walking far away from the pair.

"Annoying little slag," Sirius said under his breath, not loud enough for his son to catch. "She tries so bad to be mean but after one's dealt with Dolores Umbridge, all others seem like novices, don't they?"

"Now that you mention it…" Mia mumbled, shifting Alex in her arms. "But did you guys really give her hives because she was badmouthing me?"

"Well, it was my first week as your boyfriend – I had to prove myself worthy," he stated, casually.

Mia smiled and kissed his cheek. "Well, that's really sweet… in a strange sort of way."

He grinned in return and wrapped one arm around her waist, letting her rest her head against his shoulder.

"Sirius, Aunt Mia," they heard Harry calling a few seconds later he approached them, pulling his trunk behind him as Izzy followed him. "Hey."

"Welcome back," Mia said lively, giving them a smile before she passed the baby to Sirius and made her way to the kids, wrapping her arms in a hug around them both at the same time.

Despite being a little embarrassed by being hugged in public, they couldn't hugging her back, glad to see her okay – last time they'd laid eyes on her, she'd been lying in a bed at the Hospital Wing, rather bruised and with an injured arm. Mia pulled away a few seconds later and gave them each a smile before looking straight at Harry. "Are you okay?"

He could see in his godmother's eyes that she was talking about the prophecy – she wanted to know how he was dealing with it. Izzy realized it too, having been told of it a couple of days before and simply remained quiet, letting him speak.

"Yeah, I'm fine," he said, giving Mia a small smile. Ginny had been helping him a lot when dealing with it and he could tell for sure that he wasn't half as terrified now as he'd been before. Still, he made an effort to show himself more confident than he actually was. "I think deep down I always knew I'd have to be the one to face him. Hopefully it will all work out in the end."

His godmother's lips curled. "I'm glad you think that way."

There were a few seconds of uncomfortable silence until Izzy spoke. "So, do you know the sex of the baby already? Is it a girl? Because we really need to even the numbers back home."

"Even the numbers?" Harry asked. "For eleven years I lived alone with three women and now you're complaining about there having two of you and three of us? If anything, it should be a boy to make up for the minority of men that there was in our family for years."

"Oh, shut it," Izzy replied before turning to her mother. "So, what is it?"

"We've decided to let it be a surprise," Sirius said as he approached, holding Alex by the hand, only letting go of him so he could toddle to his mother and wrap himself around one of her legs. "Guess we'll just have to wait until mid January, which is when he or she will be born." Even though he was curious about it, himself. But he supposed he could live with it, anyway. "Well, did you guys have a good train ride?"

"Yeah, it was nice," Izzy said before turning to glare at Harry. "Except for that time when I ran into _someone_ snogging at the end of the train's hall."

"There was nobody around when we got there!" Harry protested. "And Ginny was the one who started it." Not that he was complaining about it.

Sirius chuckled – he and Mia used to be the ones that always ended up with people running into them while they were snogging. "Happens to everyone, kid." He looked back at his daughter, then, and tried to keep a casual tone. "Hum, so where's that… _boyfriend_ of yours?"

"Terry? Oh, we… we kind of broke up last night after the end-of-the-year feast," she said, letting out a single sigh. She liked Terry but not in a way that would last – they certainly didn't have the bond or the chemistry that she saw Harry and Ginny or her parents sharing. "We just realized it wouldn't work out long distance for us – he lives in Northern Ireland and his parents are Muggle, so doesn't have a floo connection… I suppose overall we're better off as friends."

Sirius was taken aback, surprised. "Really? So there's no boyfriend now?"

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "Why? Did you religiously hate the idea?"

He knew that if he said 'no' straight away it would sound as fake as it actually was… "Just a little," Sirius confessed. "Would it help if I said I was going to give him a chance to prove himself before scaring him as far away as his legs could take him?"

Izzy smiled a bit at her father's silliness before reaching for his cheek and kissing it. "You'll have a chance to do that with the next one, Daddy. I could go find one now and just bring him here for you to scare off."

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "Little pest, aren't you, Izzybel?" He turned to Harry. "Isn't she?"

"Just a little. There are girls a lot worse," Harry stated, trying to remain neutral in that matter.

"I wonder who she takes after, anyway," Mia stated, giving Sirius an amused look.

"I have no idea what you're implying," he said in a mock-offended tone as he reached for Izzy's trunk, in order to carry it for her. "Well, shall we go home now or do any of you have something else to do here?"

They all agreed to leave and, after Sirius and Mia had gotten hold of the kids' trunks and Izzy had picked her little brother up from the floor, made their way to one of the fireplaces so they could floo back to Grimmauld Place.

When all five of them reached the fireplaces, Mia wished they'd waited a couple of more minutes so they'd have avoided ending up right behind Narcissa and Draco Malfoy on the line to take the floo. Narcissa was the only one of the two to notice them but she didn't even acknowledge them until her son flooed away – Draco would make trouble out of seeing them. Then, with him gone, she turned around and gave them a cold look before speaking – thankfully, both Izzy and Harry were too far behind to hear her.

"The Dementors have left Azkaban," she said quietly. "Lucius and the others will be out in no time. When they are, they'll make you all pay for sending them in."

"We'll make sure to send you note after we're done with them," Sirius stated boldly while Mia chose not to speak. "Oh, and give Bella a message for me: next time I see her, I'll make her pay for every bruise, every cut and every break she got on my wife."

"If you have a chance," Narcissa said, stepping into the fireplace and disappearing into the fire.

Mia's hand touched his shoulder and he turned to face her. "Do you think she meant it?"

"About Malfoy and his pals wanting revenge? I'm sure she did. But there's a big difference between wanting something and getting it. If they try, we'll be ready for then," Sirius assured her. "Now, come on, let's go home."

Biting her lip nervously, Mia nodded. The talk with Narcissa might have been short but it certainly had been enough to leave a mark of fear behind…

**A/N: Sort of a filler but I hope you liked it :D Inspiration is hard on you when one has a headache the size of the moon... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	3. Fallen

The three weeks that passed since Izzy and Harry's arrival home were rather tense. The attacks on Muggles had increased severely with them growing for what the Muggle world called 'a serial killer's work' to 'a series on unfortunate natural disasters' that ended up with dozens of deaths at once. Still, there didn't seem to be any attacks within the magical community yet, which both puzzled and gave a fake sense of safety to the population… _Maybe he just wants to wipe all Muggles this time around, _some selfishly thought.

It was around nine in the morning when Sirius woke up in his bed, one of his arms wrapped around Mia's waist as she slept on her side, facing him. She looked incredibly peaceful, though her hair was a mess and all the covers seemed to have been kicked away to his side of the bed, as she usually felt rather hot due to the raging hormones of pregnancy. He removed his arm from around her and moved his hand to touch the soft bump that was starting to form on her abdomen – every day that passed, he got more and more excited to meet that baby, though he still had several months ahead of him before that happened.

Sirius got up and, carefully enough not to wake her, he kissed his wife's cheek only to have her mumbling something under her breath and sinking her face further in the pillow, snatching his as well and holding it against her. _Beautiful,_ he thought, looking at her sleeping form. Being pregnant really made her more beautiful than ever, as far as he could tell… It was with a grin that he grabbed and bunch of clothes, going to the bathroom in order to have a shower.

Around fifteen minutes later, he was already making his way into the kitchen, seeing the kids already at the table as soon as he got in. Harry seemed to be busy reading the Daily Prophet, while Izzy sat on the opposite side of the table eating absently and Kreacher stood on top of a little stool opposite the stove, cooking.

"Good morning," Sirius greeted them.

"Morning," Harry and Izzy chorused.

"Where's Alex?"

"Lulu came around ten minutes ago and took him – he was going to spend the day with her and Gabe, remember?" his daughter said.

"Oh, right, I'd completely forgotten it." He supposed he'd have to leave the usual morning session of tickling his son mercilessly for later that day… "So, is there anything interesting in the paper? Except for the usual rubbish, of course," he asked, making his way to go take a seat by Izzy's side.

"Well, apparently, they 'know' I'm the Chosen One, so to speak," Harry told him, apparently indifferent.

"Let me see that," Sirius requested, reaching for the newspaper Harry was passing to him. Apparently, the kid had once again made the headlines of the day…

_HARRY POTTER: THE CHOSEN ONE?_

_Rumours__ continue to fly about the mysterious disturbance at the Ministry of Magic last month, during which He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was sighted once more._

_H__ighly placed sources within the Ministry have confirmed that the disturbance centred on the fabled Hall of Prophecy. _

_Though Ministry spokes__-wizards have thus far refused even to confirm the existence of such a place, a growing number of the Wizarding community believe that the Death Eaters now serving sentences in Azkaban for trespass and attempted theft were attempting to steal a prophecy. The nature of that prophecy is unknown, although speculation is rife that it concerns Harry Potter, the only person ever known to have survived the Killing Curse, and who is also known to have been at the Ministry on the night in question. Some are going so far as to call Potter 'the Chosen One,' believing that the prophecy names him as the only one who will be able to rid us of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. However, neither Potter nor his guardians accepted to make any comment on this matter._

Sirius rolled his eyes and stopped reading. "Long story short, they don't know a thing and are throwing pebbles at the air, hopping to hit a bird. They were bound to start wondering about why you were at the ministry when the battle happened."

Izzy nodded, agreeing with her father. "I suppose this must be why we kept getting Owls from the Prophet to get interviews or statements."

"They'd better wait somewhere comfortable because they're not getting it anytime soon," Harry stated, reaching for a piece of toast and taking a bite from it. He didn't want a thing to do with the Daily Prophet.

"They'll just keep on speculating and writing about it," Sirius pointed out. "The blokes just want stuff to sell papers."

"I think I got that fact back in my fourth year."

"Yeah, with Skeeter following you around all year, we should be worried if you hadn't," Izzy stated.

Sirius turned a few pages of the paper, just reading the headlines of the articles. He stopped when he reached the centre page and saw two large moving black-and-white pictures: one of a man with a lion-like mane of thick hair and a rather ravaged face who was identified as Rufus Scrimgeour, Head of the Auror Office, and another one of Amelia Bones, head of the Law Enforcement Department. Over their pictures, there was a headline, naming them as the two favourites to be nominated as next Minister of Magic. Behind their photos, there was a quote from Fudge, entitled as the still acting minister, wishing them well.

Izzy glanced at the newspaper over her father's arm, raising an eyebrow. "So, if Fudge's been sacked two months ago already, how come he's still ruling the ministry?"

"He's not," Sirius replied. "Some committee is ruling the ministry until the Wizengamot elects the new minister in tomorrow's vote. Fudge may still wear the title of 'Minister' but he doesn't have the power to as much as borrow a quill from the ministry's supplies."

"I don't know about the other bloke but I think Madam Bones would make a much better minister than Fudge," Harry pointed out. She'd rubbed as a fair type of person.

Sirius nodded in agreement. "One thing is for sure, from what I know of her and what Dumbledore has told me about Scrimgeour, they don't seem the type that cracks easily under pressure like that Fudge dumba…"

He was interrupted by a sound of cracking fire in the fireplace and all of them turned their faces to it to see what it was.

"Must be Ron and Ginny in the floo," Izzy stated. "We'd told them to come here around this time." She turned her face to her father. "You're still taking us to Diagon Alley today, aren't you, Daddy? You promised you'd take us to see Fred and George's new shop."

Sirius chuckled. "I am, Izzybel, don't worry. As if _I_ didn't want to see it too… and Moony working in a joke shop."

"He's got to have plenty of experience in that area, dealing with you and my dad in Hogwarts for years," Harry pointed out just as his best mate stumbled his way out of the fire, ashes all over his red hair and face, making Harry snort. "Nice entrance."

"Oh, come off it," the redhead said, a little irritably. "I just tripped."

"Sure you did," Harry said. Floo and Ron had never seemed to agree much, if he recalled it well.

Before Ron could protest further, the girl in question also stepped out of the fire, though a lot more gracefully than her brother. "Oh, look! It's the Chosen One," she said, pointing at Harry with a mock-amazed look on her face, making him raise an eyebrow at her. "I wonder if he'd give me an autograph and a kiss if I asked him to."

"Very funny, Gin," Harry said, dryly as he got up to go join them, having already finished his breakfast. "I knew you'd find a way to get a kick out of that."

She chuckled and kissed his cheek in amusement. "Just doing my job."

"I'm sure the twins will be more than happy to add their own set of jokes later today," Izzy pointed out, standing up and making her way to them too.

"It wouldn't be Fred and George if they weren't," Ginny agreed, chuckling.

Harry grinned. He knew that too – what would be of him without his friends and his family? "Is it okay if we go upstairs to the living room?" he asked Sirius.

"Do you even need to ask? As long as you don't start snogging on the sofa…"

"Not with me around, they won't," Ron said, giving both his sister and his best friend warning looks. "Remember the deal? No snogging in front of me or I may change my mind about you guys dating." That won him a slap on the back of the head, courtesy of his sister. "Hey!"

"That's for being a git," she let him know, following Harry and making her way to the stairs that led to the ground floor with Ron following in a protest and Izzy just chuckling behind them.

Seconds later, Sirius heard the kids stopping talking to each other and greeting Mia, practically all at the same time. Then, he saw his wife coming through the door, a slightly sleepy expression on her face. "Why didn't you wake me up?" she asked as she made her way to him, sitting and curling against his side. "I hate sleeping late – it feels like I'm wasting the day."

"You looked so peaceful," he said, putting one arm around her and kissing her brow. "Besides, I've only been up for half an hour. It's not _that_ long, love."

Uninterested in pressing the matter, she pulled away a bit to look at him. "What happened to my 'good morning' kiss?"

"Nothing, it's right here," he said, reaching for her face with his hand and pressing his lips against hers softly, increasing the pressure as her response got fiercer. When they pulled away, like he did every morning since she'd told him she was pregnant, he leaned down her rounding abdomen.

She smiled when he looked up. "You know, you should start thinking of names for that baby."

"Me?"

Mia nodded. "Well, I picked the ones for Izzy and for Alex – it's only fair you get to pick this one's. But don't worry, you still have nearly six months ahead of you to decide."

"So, let's say I wanted to call it a really awful name like… I dunno, Dolores after our beloved former co-worker. You'd just let me?"

She rolled her eyes. "I obviously have the right to rule out the ones I hate. And, by the way, don't even think of naming the kid after one of us – that's just cheating."

"You're just trying to make my job harder," he accused, mock-glaring. "Fine, I suppose I can handle the job of finding a decent name… But for now," he said, reaching for a fork and the plate of breakfast food Kreacher had placed on the table a minute before and passing it to Mia, "it's time for you to feed the mommy and the baby. You're gonna need the energy if we're dropping by the joke shop like we planned."

"Or maybe for something else I feel like doing before we leave," she replied, giving him a suggestive look. "The kids seem too entertained to bother very much about us taking an extra half-hour before we leave."

"Well, aren't you feisty, these days?" he asked, grinning.

"Blame it on the hormones," she said, taking a bite of her eggs.

* * *

They'd outdone themselves, Sirius had to recognize seconds after he'd stepped into the joke shop. It was colourful, fun and completely out of the ordinary: the paradise for any prankster and an escape from the dark reality that haunted these days…

The shop was, as Ron had described it, packed with people of all ages, though kids were the majority. Still, it wasn't hard to spot one of the twins in the middle of the crowd, thanks to his Weasley red hair, standing with a little blonde girl behind the counter, apparently helping her registering sales.

"No wonder those guys are swimming in galleons…" Ginny said, nodding in approval, glancing at a bunch of tiny furry animals running inside a cage.

"They're brilliant," Izzy said under her breath as she looked around in amazement.

"Well, thank you very much, Miss Black," a familiar voice said as the other twin approached them.

At the same time Izzy turned to face him, Ginny looked up at him as well. "Hey, George," his sister greeted him and, before he could hint he wasn't George, she continued. "Don't even try – I _know_ it's you."

He huffed. "Can't even give a bloke a chance to pull a healthy joke…"

Sirius chuckled. "Hazards of the job. But really, you've done a great job here – Merlin, you'd give us all Marauders a run for our money."

"That's what Moony keeps telling us," George pointed out.

"Well, he's completely right about it," Sirius assured him.

"Is he around, by the way?" Mia inquired before she looked at Sirius. "We should drop by and say hello to him."

"Obviously," he agreed.

"Last time I checked, he was upstairs handling our negotiations with the ministry– you can there. The stairs are that way," he pointed at a door behind the counter, indicating the stairs were right behind it. "And tell him that if he gets us a good deal we'll bloody raise his salary. I swear half the galleons we make are because of him."

Sirius snorted. "We'll make sure we pass him the message," he said, circling Mia's expanding waist with his arm before they dived into the thick crowd. The elbows sticking everywhere and sweaty people were just one of the many reasons for them to hate crowds with a passion.

They found their way to the office, inside of which their old friend seemed to be having a serious conversation via floo. "… we'll make sure the products arrive by the end of the week, the werewolf said, apparently finishing the conversation. He only noticed them then he turned around from the fireplace. "Oh, I wasn't expecting to see you guys here."

"We thought we might come for a visit," Sirius told him, sitting on the chair opposite his friend's desk, Mia doing the same by his side. "What are you guys selling to the ministry? Canary creams for them to feed to all the gits in there?"

"Actually, Fred and George are developing a line of 'serious products'," he explained, looking rather proud. "Shield hats, shield cloaks and all sorts of defensive stuff. It's having an enormous success."

Mia smiled. "You're looking really good, Remus. This place suits you."

Sirius nodded in agreement with his wife. Accepting that job from Fred and George as their accountant/manager/babysitter at times had certainly changed a lot in his friend's life. He looked a lot less shaggy and sounded even less melancholic, these days – though Sirius imagined that last part might have more to do with a certain pink-haired auror than with the new job.

It was a silent acknowledgement that Remus had ended up accepting Tonks's proposition concerning him staying with her in her flat while she recovered from her injuries and that, even three weeks after she'd gone back to work, he still hadn't moved back to his place. Sirius liked to believe he'd given a push to it with the advice he'd given his friend – Merlin knew the guy was self-pitying and pig-headed enough to keep himself away from Tonks, thinking it was the best for her.

"I suppose keeping busy is good for me," Remus replied, forcing a nonchalant tone as he sat behind the tidy wooden desk, pretending to be tidying a bunch of rolls of parchment.

"We all know it's not just about being 'busy'," Sirius said. "You've found _the_ job. Just with the right amount of responsibility for Remus Lupin and with enough mischief for a Marauder. Not to mention that you probably have the funniest bosses that ever lived," Sirius said with a chuckle. "Comfortable as an old shoe."

Remus sighed. Sometimes it felt like he didn't deserve any of that, his life turning around for better in a matter of such short months. He felt genuinely happy for the first time in years, even with the war blowing up all around him. And, he knew, now was too late to give it all up, even if his martyr self kept telling him he should: he felt like he belonged in that job and Dora… well, the fact that he'd moved in with her without even noticing it spoke for itself. He was too far gone to pull away from any of it and happy about that fact. "Hum, so how are the kids?" he asked, changing the subject. "Did you bring them?"

Mia nodded. "Yes, they're downstairs with Ron, Hermione and Ginny. Lulu's taken Alex for the day, though. We'll bring him some other day."

He nodded. That reminded him that Dora had suggested they babysit Alex together some day – she liked kids, loved them, actually, and that fact made him a little uneasy sometimes… He glanced at Mia's pregnant belly and gulped, immediately looking away.

Just as he did, there was a knock on the door and it opened, Bill Weasley's head peaked into the room.

"Sorry to interrupt but I have an urgent message to give Mia," he said, apologetic as opened the door further and stepped in, closing the door behind him.

Mia raised an eyebrow. "Me?"

He nodded. "Dumbledore flooed your place but you weren't there and Kreacher told him you were here – I was the closest one to pass them message 'cause I was at Gringotts. It seems they need you at the order's headquarters ASAP. As a healer, I mean. They needed someone trustworthy – he said Sirius should come too if it was possible."

At first, she wondered why they'd called her if they needed a healer, since she wasn't practicing anymore. But then she recalled there probably wasn't anyone else available – Elizabeth was on vacation with her family out of the country and Madam Pomfrey would likely be hard to contact, seeing as she was out of the castle enjoying her Summer Break as well.

"What happened?" Sirius inquired, worried. "What do they need a healer for?"

Bill shrugged. "No idea. Dumbledore just asked me to give you the message – he seemed to be busy. I've got to get back to the bank… the Goblins are pretty strict about the break times."

"Sure, sure," Sirius mumbled. "Thanks for passing the message – we'll see if we can let you know what it is about later."

The oldest of the Weasley children nodded and thanked them before quickly making his way out of the room, leaving the three alone again.

"There must have been an attack," Remus concluded.

Mia and Sirius nodded. "Sounds likely," Sirius stated. "We should get going, then, if it's so urgent."

"But what about the kids? What do we do with them? Send them back home?" Mia asked.

"No, let them be. I'll keep an eye on them," Remus promised. "They're safe here, don't worry – the shop may be a public place but the twins were careful with the wards: the upper floor where they have the apartment is like a fortress. I'll make sure they're safe if, Merlin help not, something happens."

"Thank you, Remus," Mia said, getting up at the same time Sirius did the same. "If they ask where we went…"

"…I'll say you're running some errands for Dumbledore – that's all we really know at the moment. Go, they'll be just fine."

Leaving their friends and the kids behind, they quickly made their way out of the store through the back door and apparated a couple of streets away from the headquarters. They walked in a fast pace hand in hand, silently comforting each other from the tension they were feeling at the moment, until they reached the pearl white coloured house and made their way to the lower ground floor that was the order's domain.

The entrance was locked, they noticed, so they knocked on the door. A few seconds passed before they were able to hear steps on the opposite side of the door and, to Mia's surprise, it was her father's voice that asked who it was.

"It's me, Gabe, Mia," she said. "Dumbledore had me called. I'm with Sirius."

"_You know I've got to check,_" his voice came through the door. "_What's your mother's full name?_"

Mia sighed. "Lucy Kathleen Graham, also known as Lulu, though you usually call her Luce."

The door clicked as soon as she finished saying it and Gabriel opened it. "Get in. Quick," he told them cautiously, rushing them in to close the door back behind them.

"I thought you were with Lulu and Alex," she said.

He nodded. "I was but I got summoned. They're fine, don't worry."

"There's been an attack, hasn't it?" Sirius inquired.

He nodded gravelly. "Two, actually. At the same time to specific targets."

"Who?" Mia asked.

"Rufus Scrimgeour and Amelia Bones," Gabriel told them.

"They're the two favourites to become minister," Sirius said. "It can't be a coincidence that they were targeted."

Mia gulped. "Did any of them…?"

"Not yet. Bones is here – they used the Cruciatus on her for a while but there doesn't seem to be permanent damage but we had you called to make sure. But Scrimgeour… I didn't see him but, according to Dumbledore, he's a mess and they had to take him to St. Mungo's immediately."

"But how the hell did they get to them?" Sirius asked. Scrimgeour was head auror.

Gabe shrugged. "All I know is that they got Scrimgeour in the middle of the street – witnesses say there were over half a dozen Death Eaters just to get him but that he gave one hell of a fight before they wounded him – and Bones in her own place. According to what she said, she managed to lock herself in a room for a while and sent a Patronus straight to the auror department. Kingsley managed to get there with a team in time and had Tonks bringing her straight here to make sure they wouldn't be able to finish the job."

"Merlin," Sirius said under his breath. "They wanted to start big when changing targets to wizards instead of muggles."

"Where is she?"

"In one of the smaller bedroom – Tonks is there keeping an eye on her," he informed her.

"I'll go check on her, then," she turned to Sirius. "Maybe you should stay here – she'll want her privacy."

He nodded and leaned to kiss her cheek. "I'll wait for you to get back."

Like Gabriel had said, Mia found them in the small bedroom that had barely been touched since the times Lily and James Potter lived in that house. She could barely recognize the Amelia Bones she'd met in the previous year in that pale, exhausted woman that rested on the small bed.

"How is she?" she asked Tonks.

"She feels a little shaky but is holding firm," the metamorphagus said. "Mostly, she's just worried. We got her out of there just in time – Bellatrix was there. She escaped before we could do anything. She was the one using the Cruciatus, according to Bones."

"She's a really sick bitch," Mia said under her breath, her hand covering the bump on her stomach. Bellatrix might have killed her and her baby little more than a month before. She let out a sigh and approached the pale woman on the bed, trying to keep her voice as soothing as possible. Trying to seem calm for the patient helped them feel calm as well – that was a technique they'd thought her as a trainee."

"Madam Bones," she said. "I'm…"

"Mia Black," Bones finished. "I remember we've met before. You're Harry Potter's godmother." She forced a smile. "I wish we'd met again in a more pleasant occasion."

Mia smiled back softly. "You're not the only one. How are you feeling?"

"I've had better days but I understand my fate could have been a lot worse," she stated. "Professor Dumbledore insisted to have me checked by a healer."

"I just need to cast a few diagnosis spells – it shouldn't take long," Mia assured her – if she wasn't too rusty, that was. While that sort of spells had been routine when she practiced healing, it had been a while since she'd used them.

Thankfully, it all went smoothly and, with Bones's cooperation she was done in ten minutes. While Mia worked, the other woman talked to her: she expressed grief for what the world was turning into and, in a moment of heavier sorrow, told her about her husband, Edgar Bones, who Mia faintly remembered to belong to the first order, being killed during the first war. That made her feel a slight pang in her heart, fearing, like she did when she got herself thinking of the war, that Sirius would share that fate.

The woman ended up sinking into unconsciousness at some point, drained by the fatigue just as Mia concluded there wasn't be any sort of permanent damage caused by the Cruciatus.

Scrimgeour, however, wasn't so lucky, as Dumbledore arrived with bad news just as Mia and Tonks had joined Sirius and Gabe in the main room of the headquarters.

"Rufus Scrimgeour didn't make it," Dumbledore had informed them, sorrowful. "The healers couldn't do anything - there was too much damage done to him."

"So, they managed to kill one of the favourites for Minister," Sirius said through his teeth, immensely frustrated. "What for? Try to send more messages?"

"I'm afraid this time it was because he knows neither Madam Bones nor Rufus Scrimgeour would be corrupted by him," Dumbledore said. "Lord Voldemort fears them but, thank Merlin, he didn't completely succeed in getting them out of his way. It's almost certain Amelia Bones will be the next Minister of Magic and she'll protect the Wizarding World in every way she can."

"She's a strong woman," Mia mused. For the first time since Sirius had been arrested due to the ministry's incompetence, she felt admiration for a minister of potential minister.

"But she'll need protection," Tonks pointed out. "We'll have someone assigned to her permanently – there's already been one attempt to her life, after all."

"This is not going to get any easier, is it?" Sirius asked. "Even with her as minister. They'll keep wiping people until that snake-faced son of a bitch has it all."

"Or until someone stops him," Mia said, reaching for his hand. _Until Harry stops him_, she thought, grieving and hoping at the same time. Hopefully, she thought, hopefully he'd be ready when the time came.

**A/N: Well, the first death occurred (don't worry I won't start killing people left, right and centre). I hope you liked the chapter. Next week, however, I'll be going to Paris for the school break and, though I can't promise because I don't know if my internet will work there, I'm hoping to post anyway. Cross fingers for it :D Feedback is very welcome. Review!**


	4. Memory Lane

Amelia Bones started her mandate as the Minister of Magic in the beginning of August with the support of most of the wizarding community. Everyone knew her job wouldn't be easy, especially with a war happening, but changes could already be seen in the way the ministry was dealing with the threat of Voldemort's return: most of the Auror department, now under Kingsley Shacklebolt's command, was concentrated in finding and catching Death Eaters, as well as patrolling the most populated areas for protection; several new departments were created to deal with the crisis and 'panic keys', random everyday objects that were charmed to directly alert the Auror department of the occurrence of an attack, were spread freely among the whole wizarding population.

Still, despite the efforts, attacks kept occurring every other day and people kept getting killed, being the favourite targets unknowing Muggles, though wizards were still thrown in the middle. Emmeline Vance had been the first member of the Order to fall and, so far, the only one, being killed in a battle, while defending a whole village full of Muggles.

Every time Sirius was called to fight on a battle, Mia's heart clenched, only relaxing once he made it back home unharmed and enveloped her with one of his tight, warm hugs. She loved her unborn baby immensely but sometimes, all of those happening when she had to stay behind while he was in a fight, she wished the pregnancy hadn't come in such an inconvenient time so she'd be able to fight by her husband's side…

At the moment, Mia sat on the living room sofa, unsuccessfully trying to distract herself with some reading. She huffed and glanced at the clock that rest near the muggle telly – it was nearly two in the morning. Sirius had been fetched by the order a couple of hours before as an attack was happening near Cardiff and, as far as she knew, he could take two or three more to come back. Yet, she never went to bed without him being back from a battle, even if her eyes threatened to close every five minutes…

Kreacher had already came around twice, trying to convince her to go to sleep, promising he'd wake her up as soon as Sirius was back but she'd preferred to stay the way she was. Just because she couldn't be at the battle, it didn't mean she had to sleep right through it. Besides, she was sure she wouldn't get any restful sleep with her husband out and possibly with his life in danger.

She made an effort not to let her mind drift to those thoughts and closed the book, knowing trying to read at that moment was pointless. Just as she put the book down, Mia heard her daughter's voice coming through the door, making her turn. "Mom, what are you doing awake?" Izzy asked sleepily.

"Nothing at the moment, really," Mia replied as Izzy approached, dragging her feet. "What are _you_ doing awake, sweetie?"

Izzy sat on the sofa by her mother's side and reached to lean her head against her mother's shoulder like she used t when she was a little girl. "I went to the bathroom and saw the lights on down here. Where's Dad?"

Mia wrapped one arm around her. "He's out, doing something for the Order."

"Was there another attack?" Izzy inquired, a little anxious.

"Yes," she said, honestly.

Izzy sighed. "It's like they happen every day, now."

"It won't last forever."

"I know. Harry will beat them all senseless," her daughter stated. She trusted him completely to beat Voldemort and fulfil his part of the prophecy – Harry was her big brother, after all, and since they were little kids, he'd always been one of the people she looked up at. Izzy needed to believe he'd be the one to win or no one else would. "But it suc… it's awful while they do happen."

Mia's hands soothed her daughter's long hair that matched hers perfectly. "We'd stop it right now if we could," she said. "You should go to bed, sweetie. It's late."

"It's late for you too," Izzy replied, putting her hand in front of her mouth to cover a yawn. "Can't I wait for Dad to come back?"

"It can take a while," Mia pointed out. "Honey, you're tired. Just go to bed and sleep – he won't come any faster if you stay awake."

Izzy sighed. "Fine." She kissed her mother's cheek before standing up. "Give him a kiss for me when he arrives okay?"

"I'll give him two," she replied, smiling warmly at her daughter as she dragged her feet back out of the room.

Mia sighed, then, wondering what she would do to entertain herself. Trying to read was useless as her eyes kept dropping and, according what Lulu said, Muggle telly was terrible after midnight. She got up, knowing that remaining sitting likely wouldn't help her with anything… She sighed and made her way out of the living room, turning the lights off behind her. For now, she'd go check on Alex.

After going up a few flights of stairs, Mia reached her son's room and, carefully not to make noise, she opened the door and went through it. The room wasn't completely dark as either she or Sirius usually left a soft light on so the little boy wouldn't be scared by the darkness if he woke up during the night.

Alex slept peacefully in his cot, his little arms wrapped around his favourite toy, the black stuffed dog, which he'd christened _Shuffas, _a toddler version of Harry's suggestion for a name, 'Snuffles'. With his face flushed by the slumber, he looked like a little angel, tough, as she saw so much of Sirius in him, he'd probably get some marauder features at some point.

That idea brought her back to thinking of Sirius, though not in such a depressive way. He was up to something, she knew. Lately, he'd go out from time to time, just telling her he had to go 'take care of something' with that plotting grin of his all over his face. Then, he'd be gone for an hour or so. She'd inquired him about it a few times but he'd either tell her to trust him or, when the question came during one of her hormonal rages, would seduce her into forgetting it.

He was as slick as a weasel, she'd give him that. And she had a feeling her son would inherit that trait as well, seeing as he could charm anyone into doing nearly anything his one and a half year-old mind wished. Mia reached down and pulled the covers, which had apparently been kicked down to the bottom of the bed, over Alex so he wouldn't get cold and caressed his soft baby hair. For now, she didn't really have to worry about his possible future slick ways…

A light knock on the door announced someone else's presence and she turned to see Sirius had arrived and was standing right outside the door. He didn't look harmed or grave, just tired, which was a fairly positive sign. "Hey," he whispered.

"Hi," she replied softly, glad to see him. Mia gave her son one last look before she made her way to the door, closing it behind her not to disturb Alex. Then, she felt herself relaxing as pressed her body against his in a hug and her head rested on his firm chest.

Sirius's arms came around her waist and he kissed the top of her head, just letting her hold him in relief for a few seconds. He wished he could make it easier for her but it wasn't simple… He hoped that little surprise he'd been preparing would help.

She pulled away and looked up at him a few moments later, reaching to kiss his cheeks,. "Izzy asked me to give that to you earlier." Then, her lips touched his in a loving and welcoming fashion. "That one was from me."

"Kisses from two beautiful ladies. I'm not worthy," he said, giving her a tired smile. "I'd keep on trying my luck but I think I'm too weary for something fancier than a kiss."

Mia moved to his side and gave a little nod towards the entrance of the room. "Come on, let's get you to bed, then."

After the made it into the room, she sat on her side of the bed and watched him change out of his clothes. "Did anyone die?" Her tone came shakier than she'd expected as she looked at his face reflected on the full-length mirror that stood in the corner of the room.

He shook his head. "No. Some got wounded but it was nothing life-threatening. They didn't put much of an effort to it this time – rookie Death Eaters, Kingsley said," he quoted, his tone sounding rather disgusted. "It's bad because they're recruiting but at least those new blokes are as clumsy causing havoc as a teenage boy about to shag a girl for the first time."

"You're not making it sound better just so I don't worry, are you?"

He turned around, still bare-chested and looked her right in the eyes. "I promised I wouldn't lie to you again and I meant it, Mia. You can ask Lulu if you want to – she and Gabe were there and she'll tell you just the same."

Mia shook her head. "No, I believe you." she got up, making her way to him, and touched his forearm with her hand. "And I suppose I wouldn't see you trying to shield the pregnant woman from the awful battle as much of a lie. I did believe it when you promised you wouldn't lie to me again – that fight we had two months ago is more than behind us."

He visibly relaxed and reached for her cheek, placing a light kiss on it as his hand softly caressed the bulge on her stomach covered by the thin nightgown she was wearing. "I know – I'm just a little edgy. It wasn't bad but it was still a fight with Death Eaters."

She made her way back to the bed as he released her from his hold. "Tell me about it," Mia requested. "Who exactly got hurt?"

"Well, Tonks fell down a flight of stairs and broke a leg – Moony fixed it for her and gave her a scolding for always managing to get herself hurt, she laughed it off and said it was a good excuse for him to feel manly by carrying her all the way home." He snorted before putting on a grey shirt. "You should have seen _him_ trying to keep a serious face. Also, Charlie Weasley will have a pretty neat scar on his arm to show off when he goes back to Romania – the bloke says those girls at the dragon reservation really have a thing for scarred blokes and I suppose he'll use that as much as he possibly can to impress them."

Mia chuckled as he joined her in the bed and lied down by her side. She let out a sigh and rested her body against his, laying her head on his shoulder as he wrapped one arm around her. There was no comparison between sleeping with him by her side and sleeping alone.

"I should tell you now that I have plans for both of us tomorrow."

"What kind of plans?" she asked, looking up at him curiously.

"That's for me to know and you to find out, Mrs. Black," he told her, grinning

"Is it about that secret plotting you've been having lately?"

"Maybe. I'll tell you in the morning," Sirius promised. "But for now, let's go to sleep. I'm exhausted, okay?"

Mia just didn't push it because she could hear the fatigue in his voice. "I'll make sure you do tell me," she stated, reaching to his face to press a kiss to his lips. "Good night."

"'Night," he replied, grinning as she cuddled back on his side. _And sweet dreams for my baby,_ he thought, gently brushing the tips of his fingers on her stomach. "Love you."

"Love you too," she replied. And, seconds after she closed her eyes, sleep took her in gently.

* * *

In the following morning right after breakfast, Mia inquired her husband about his plans for the day as they carried their son up to his room in order to dress him. Sirius's answer came as a wide grin and another question.

"What are your plans for the next few days?"

"Nothing specific." She raised a suspicious eyebrow as Alex reached for her while Sirius carried him up. "Sirius Orion Black, what exactly are you planning to do?"

"I'm trying to surprise you," he replied and decided to go ahead with the full explanation. "At first, I thought of giving us all a break from this mess of a war by taking us and the kids out for a little vacation in some tropical island like last year. Still, when I asked the kids if they wanted it, they were a little… hesitant."

"What do you mean?" Mia asked, confused.

"Well, they seem to know that we… we're very affectionate lately and they'd rather have a good excuse to escape when we have one of those moments, such as going to the Burrow or the twin's shop." He coughed, embarrassed with the situation and tried to find something to add. "Besides, Harry's with Ginny and you know during the first year leaving your other half behind is like leaving a limb. As for this little bugger," he tickled Alex as he said that, making him giggle and call him 'Daddy', "well, he's still having a little trouble with expressing his opinion with more than three-word sentences."

"So, no vacation," Mia concluded as they stepped into the room and made her way to the dresser to get Alex's clothes.

Sirius sat on the rocking chair with his son, the little boy trying to stand up on his lap and touching his face with his tiny little hands. "Actually," he started, "they suggested we went instead. Just the two of us."

She raised an eyebrow. "Sirius, going far away and leaving the kids by themselves…"

"They won't be by themselves," he replied. "Lulu and Gabe say they'll be more than happy to stay here and take care of them, Alex included. You know they'd never let them get hurt, Mia. Besides, it won't be as long or as far away if the kids are staying here – you won't even have to leave the country." _Or the city, _he added in his mind.

Mia sighed and approached him, watching her son hold himself up by gripping his father's shoulders. The longest she'd been away from him was a single night… she wasn't sure how she felt about going on vacation and leaving her little boy behind. "We really won't have to leave the country?" she asked, just trying to convince herself to give in.

"Nope," Sirius confirmed. "I knew you wouldn't want to stay too far away without them and, honestly, neither do I. It will only be a couple of nights now and we'll just be a fireplace away, though I'm hoping people will leave us alone while we're out…" he stated, sitting Alex on his lap so she could dress him more easily. "Let the two of us take a break before things get even worse, okay?"

_Two nights a__ren't that long. And having the floo available_… Mia supposed she didn't have a reason to say 'no'. She sighed, carefully pulling the pyjama shirt over her son's head and replacing it with a freshly clean baby blue t-shirt. "If something happens…"

"We'll be back in a heartbeat," Sirius promised immediately. "Trust me on this, okay? I've been making sure this will go as smoothly as it can possibly go for you. This is something we _need_ to do."

She felt there was a deeper meaning behind the world 'need' that time around… "Alright. But you have to take the two-way mirror. I want to use it to contact the kids and make sure they're okay." Mia let out a breath. "So, when do we leave? Tonight?"

"Actually, a couple of hours from now would be the best," he stated, naturally, making her suddenly stop her task of dressing their little son and look up at him in surprise.

"Merlin, you really have been planning all this ahead, haven't you?"

He smiled. "It's something I've been thinking of doing for a while. I talked to Gabe yesterday and he said he and Lulu could be here around noon," he stated.

Mia sighed. The mention of her father had reminded her that he was now 'alive to the world', after Bones had taken care of making it official for them with no questions as a way of thanking the Order for having protected her after the attempt on her life. The new Minister had offered to keep the fact that he was alive a secret but Gabe, and Lulu as well, had decided it was time he stopped hiding, as it was likely a bunch of Death Eaters already knew he was alive, from seeing him in the Department of Mysteries, where glamour charms didn't work. So, as of a week before, Gabriel McKinnon had 'resurrected' for the world. Even if he was a target now, Mia was sure he'd give quite a fight to anyone who tried to harm him or his family.

"Mama, shoooo," she heard her little son saying, his little hand pointing at his bare feet, a tiny frown on his face.

Mia looked down at the rocking chair and saw Sirius looking at her with an eyebrow rose too. "Day-dreaming?" he asked her. "The little man here thinks you've forgotten him."

She reached down and caressed the little boy's hair. "Mummy hasn't," she assured him.

Having the attention back, Alex giggled and this time pointed at his mother's overgrown stomach. "Bebe!"

"Yep, that's a baby brother or sister for you, mate," Sirius confirmed as Mia went to fetch a pair of small-sized shoes. He looked up at his wife questioningly when she made it back to him. "Well and what do you say, Mrs. Black? Will you let me take you away for a couple of days?"

Mia sighed. "Well, I suppose I will." She reached down to place a kiss on her son's cheek. "Lulu must be able to handle this one and the other two with Gabe…"

* * *

When the time to actually leave arrived, as much as she was excited to find out what Sirius had planned for them, Mia felt a little hesitant when leaving the kids at home. While Harry and Izzy had promised to _try_ to stay out of trouble, Lulu didn't seem to be in a patient mood after her oldest grandkids left ahead of her to go have lunch at the burrow.

"Mia, I'm going to say this as nicely as I possibly can at the moment… Get your pregnant arse of this house before I make you," Lulu threatened, narrowing her eyes. One thing that had always impressed Mia was that even though her mother was at least three or four inches shorter than her, she was damn intimidating when she wanted to. "Stop worrying, go out with your husband and get laid until you go blind." That last part made Gabe shiver a little and pretend to be absently looking out the window, which made Lulu raise her eyebrows at him. "Where do think her kids are coming from? Baby-bearing storks? If you do, that bloody well explains how you got me knocked up back in Hogwarts."

"_Me_?" he asked in disbelief. "Not that it really matters but you were the one who started it, remember?"

Feeling she wouldn't want to be there to hear the rest of her parent's discussion, Mia actually was the one to urge Sirius to leave the room so they could get out and go on their little vacation, leaving the others behind.

"I think I'm ready to go now," she said under her breath, making her way out of the room.

"Finally." He chuckled at his wife's reaction to her parent's fight and reached for his pocket, removing a silver muggle pen from it. "When you're ready, just touch the portkey and I'll charm it to leave."

She only took time to shrink her suitcase to the size of a wallet and shove it into her pocket before she reached to touch the tiny portkey. Sirius tapped it when his wand, and then, almost immediately, the familiar rather confusing feeling of being pulled at a high speed took over.

When they landed, she was thankful to be on her feet, her eyes still closed, though, as a sudden wave of nausea hit her. Merlin, did she hate Portkeys… She practically hadn't experienced any morning sickness with that pregnancy but a portkey travel had proved to be too much… She felt Sirius's arm circling her body as she took deep breaths, fighting back the nausea. It took several seconds, but it got better.

"You okay?" he asked her.

"Hum, hum," she replied, nodding, still not opening her eyelids.

"Well, open your eyes, then," he encouraged her softly.

She took another breath and did so. Not a second passed before she recognized her surroundings. "Oh, Sirius," she whispered.

"Welcome home… or where it used to be," he said, giving her a small smile and kissing her brow.

They were back in their little lower-ground floor flat, the one they'd shared after leaving Hogwarts. Their first home. She was standing in their living room, where they used to sit with Lily and James for endless hours, talking and laughing. And, despite the years, the room looked exactly the same as it had when she'd last been in it, to her surprise. Not a single layer of dust. She didn't need to wait more than a moment before Sirius explained how that had happened.

"I've been coming here for the past week in order to get it ready for us to spend a few nights," he stated. "Kreacher stocked the place with food when I mentioned we might need a few meals ready – he said his mistress needed to eat well so her baby would be healthy like 'young master Alex'. Honestly, I think the little bastard has a crush on you, Mia."

She had to laugh, still touched by his actions. "I'm sure he's just trying to be nice, Sirius. But, Merlin, I can't believe you did all this for me."

_I'd move mountains for you,_ he thought. "Like I said, I thought you'd want to be near home – it's just a twenty-minute walk from here, actually, though the floo takes a second. I promise that, when we go back, we won't take a portkey – I just wanted to surprise you. We needed to do this, come back together."

Mia smiled at him warmly. "Thank you," she said, meaning the whole action itself, before she stood on her toes and reached to kiss his lips. His response was, as always, fierce and immediate. How long had it been since they'd last kissed in that room? she wondered. _That last night we were together before I had to leave,_ she replied to herself. He was going to propose that night, she would have certainly said 'yes'. They pulled away a few seconds later but their foreheads kept touching. "I never really had the courage to come here ever since I came back to Britain. I had Kreacher come here for me and get your things…"

He nodded. "I understand the feeling. Last week when I first stepped foot in here since we moved, the memories were overwhelming. I practically couldn't move for around five minutes."

"We could have had a life here," she whispered sadly. "We could have raised Izzy here – I was pregnant too the last time I was in this flat. With her."

"Life takes ridiculously unbelievable turns, doesn't it?" he asked. "But if things had gone in any other way, they wouldn't be the same." His hand reached to brush against her cheek. We're happy, Mia, despite everything. We have great kids, a little boy that who knows if might exist in another reality and another baby on the way. If I ever had a chance to go back with all the things I know now, I'd probably do some things differently but if I ended up in the exact same place we're now, I wouldn't have been disappointed, Mia."

"Neither would I," she whispered. "I'll always wonder, though…"

He nodded. "So will I. We can wonder together. But for now… now I want us to have a break from the world in this place. Just you, me… and, well, the baby." He added with a chuckle. "I came up with a couple of middle names, by the way. I think I'll leave the first one to decide when we meet him or her, like we did with Alex."

"Well, and what did you came up with?"

"Elizabeth for a girl, Harper for a boy," he said and, before she could express her surprise, continued. "Elizabeth probably saved your life and the baby's – I suppose that makes her worthy of the title of namesake, as we may have another plans for the one of godmother. What do you think? Are you gonna use your 'mother power' to rule out the names?"

"Of course not," Mia assured him, giving him a little smile. "I love the names. Elizabeth's going to be thrilled. But let's make it a surprise, okay? Until the baby is born. I suppose it will have a better effect if we make it that way." She reached up to kiss him, softly this time. "I knew you'd pick a good name."

"The middle name is just half the assignment," he pointed out.

"Halfway great, then," Mia offered. "You know, sometimes it's like you just know exactly what's the perfect thing to do for me. Like bringing me here. I'm really glad you did." She turned around, pressing her back against his body as he circled her with his arms and rested his hands on top of her baby bump. Everything really did look exactly like she'd let it back when that place was their home. It felt strange, though not in a bad way, to look back and think of the past they'd had there. "So, we'll stay here for the next couple of nights?"

"That's the plan."

"And is there a bed still in our old room?"

"There was yesterday," he pointed out, his lips curling playfully as he swirled her to face him again. "I'm not sure about the mattress, though. We should give it a try… see if it's as firm as it used to be. One can never now."

"Hum, I recall you being smoother when trying to seduce me back in the day, Mr. Black," she pointed out, faking disappointment as his lips reached to touch a spot right between her neck and shoulder, teasing flesh and giving her goosebumps.

"I'm saving the smoothness for the act, if you don't mind," Sirius stated.

She smiled. "No, not at all."

**A/N: Explanation for the very romantic (maybe mushy) content of the chapter: I'm in Paris guys. It's the air... Not really a plot developer chapter but time was short due to the tourist-y activities :D I hope you liked the filler, anyway . Soon, this volume will return to its paralel with the books (btw, Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows are my favourites, so I have lots of plans for them). Feedback is always welcome! Have a great Easter if you celebrate it! Review!**


	5. Gathering

**A/N: I'm dedicating this chapter to one of my first readers and a good friend, Joana, who fought so bravely until the end and will be very missed.**

**11 August 1996**

Bringing Mia back to their old flat had probably been the best idea he'd had in months, Sirius concluded as he woke up with soft, warm lips brushing the bare flesh of his chest. He knew it probably had more to do with the massive amount of pregnancy hormones running through her veins than with his romantic gesture but, Merlin, had she gotten even more affectionate than usual…

Her lips slowly made their way up until they touched his own for a long, passionate kiss. His hands reached up to touch her back, which he found covered only with the thin fabric of her satin nightgown. As she deepened the kiss, he thought for a moment they'd just keep on kissing until one of them passed out due to lack of oxygen. However, maybe for their lives' sakes, she pulled away a few seconds later, breathing heavily.

He opened his eyes to see his wife's brown orbs looking down at him, a blaze of loving lust in them. In that exact moment, as he thought of how deeply he could lose himself in those eyes, he wished, really wished, that baby she was carrying would get its mother's eyes, as both Izzy and Alex had gotten his already.

His hand reached up for her face as her body locked his under hers, though several inches above him in order to keep her bump from being squeezed. "Well, isn't this a wonderful way for me to wake up?" he asked with a grin.

"I thought it would be." She smiled back and, in a matter of seconds, that rather fiery look he'd seen in her eyes softened into Mia's usually warm expression. She shifted her body so she was cuddled against him, clinging to his side the way she had so many times before, back when they lived in that house.

One of his arms circled her and his hand rubbed her back soothingly. He wished he could stay like this forever. "We should get up at some point, shouldn't we?" Sirius asked. "We're supposed to go back home today."

"Hum, hum," she replied, nodding before she mumbled against his shoulder. "It was wonderful us being here alone but I sort of miss being with the kids already."

"Yeah, I miss them too," Sirius replied. "And speaking of kids, we've got that thing at the Burrow. Ginny's birthday. We're supposed to be there by lunch-time."

"Yeah, and if we arrive a minute late, Lulu will start joking that we couldn't keep out of each other's pants until the last minute," Mia said dryly.

Sirius chuckled. "Well, that's actually sort of my plan. Just let me get some breakfast and I'll be up for another round. I wonder if we still could manage in the shower…"

She slapped his shoulder as she sat up. "You randy git. Can't think of anything else, can you?"

"You're one to talk, woman. Last night, you woke me up at three in the morning and quite literally jumped me!"

"Oh, that was just the hormones," she said, looking away a bit embarrassed. She _really_ hadn't been able to help it. "They make me feel… turned on sometimes."

Sirius faked an appalled look. "Using your beloved husband just scratch an itch," he shook his head in a mock-disapproving fashion. "_Shame on you_. Now I feel objectified. My own wife…"

"Oh, just shut up," Mia told him, rolling her eyes as he laughed. "I know you liked it just as much as I did, so, when you're done with the laughter, we might want to head to the kitchen and have some breakfast, as your unborn child is hungry."

"Well, if that's the case…" He motioned to get up and circled the bed, giving her his hand to help her up too. As soon as she was standing, he pulled her body to his and gave her a small kiss on the lips before they left the room and made their way to the kitchen.

When they got there, however, it was to their surprise that they found a brown owl tapping on the window monotonously with its beak.

"Oh, come on, we were supposed to have a few more hours alone," Sirius complained, pouting like a kid. Why couldn't people just leave them alone for a little longer?

Mia made her way to the window and opened it, taking the message from the bird that remained where it was, likely waiting for an answer. She closed the window back and made her way to sit by the table, her eyes not leaving the handwriting on the envelope that she immediately identified as Dumbledore's. At first, she wondered how the headmaster knew where they were but then she recalled that at Hogwarts they always knew exactly where people were. She looked nervous at the envelope, wondering if it brought bad news.

"From Dumbledore?" Sirius asked, peaking over her shoulder, receiving a nod as a reply. "Well, open it, then."

"I was just going to," she replied, turning the envelope around and breaking its seal before removing the letter, which didn't seem long judging by the first glance.

_Dear Sirius and Amelia,_

_First of all, let me assure you that I'm not writing to give you any bad news or summoning you to give them to you face to face._

It was like he was reading their minds, Mia thought. Or maybe he just knew the fear of a war well enough to know that a simple letter could cause one's blood pressure to hit record levels. She drew a small smile with her lips and resumed reading.

_If it was convenient to you, I was hoping you could spare me an little time, today if possible, and come to my office so we could discuss a few matters concerning some arrangements for the new school-year at Hogwarts and Harry's extra-curricular activities.__I shall explain this more fully when I see you._

_Kindly send your answer by return of this owl. Hoping to see you today,_

_I am, yours most sincerely,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

"What do you reckon he means by 'extra-curricular activities'?" Sirius inquired, raising an eyebrow. "The only one I can think of is Quidditch."

"I guess we'll just have to meet him to find out," Mia said. "We could drop by before we head to the Burrow, Molly probably won't be serving lunch until one in the afternoon at least. If we leave by noon…"

Sirius moaned. "Looks the vacation is really over."

Mia shook her head. "Not yet. It's still ten and we have yet two hours to use, Mr. Black. I hope you don't intend to waste them, of course…"

A little smile covered his face as he sat by her side. "Well, if you say so… We could do this more often, you know? We can use this place to hide when we just need a break from the world."

She smiled. "Yeah, I'd like that." She leaned her head against his shoulder. "This is our little home away from home… well, not that far away but you get my point."

He placed a kiss on the top of her head. "Yeah, this is our special place." He let out a huff. "Now, why don't you go ahead and write back to Dumbledore while I make us some breakfast?" Sirius gave her a suggestive look. "Maybe if we hurry we'll have time for that last round I promised you."

"Oh, I'm sure you'll make time if we don't," she pointed out.

"What can I say? I take these matters very seriously."

As it turned out, they ended up arriving at Hogwarts a few minutes late, which highly annoyed Mia as she hated being late for anything. Thankfully, according to Hagrid, Dumbledore had also been held up due to a little trouble with the centaurs in the forest so, by the time they got to the headmaster's office, he still wasn't there.

They sat on the chairs by the desk and were happy to see that the office still looked the same as it had before Umbridge had 'taken over' the position of headmistress. No doubt, the fact that the office had closed itself to her had helped or else Sirius imagined it would have become the same pool of pink, ribbons and lace that her office had been.

All around them, the portraits of the former headmasters lived their 'painted lives', chatting among themselves, having monologues – one of those consisting of some dark-looking bloke reciting in verse the most gruesome Hogwarts rules that, Sirius and Mia hoped, had been overruled centuries before – or napping in their frames. One of those portraits, Phineas Nigellus Black, stared at Sirius fixedly with his eyes narrowing. Sirius, noticing the staring, narrowed his eyes back at him. "What now?"

"Well, if it isn't my worthless, ungrateful great-great-grandson," the portrait spat. "Had to ship my portrait straight to the attic as soon as you took over my family's house, hadn't you?"

Sirius chuckled. "Hum, you waited all this time to be alone with us so you could bug me about it, did you? Merlin, being a portrait must be a damn boring way to live." He'd almost forgotten how much he _loved_ annoying the old berk when he was a kid – as it was practically the only interesting thing to do when he was home during the school breaks – even if his _dear_ mother would get really mental about him disrespecting his ancestors, which he always replied to with a '_Who cares? The guy's dead_'.

"Actually, I was the one who had Kreacher shipping your portrait to the attic," Mia pointed out casually.

"But don't hold it against her – your presence, even if in a portrait, was always creepy for children," Sirius stated, grinning before turning to his wife. "Wonder how this bloke made the most hated headmaster Hogwarts ever had."

"Until Umbridge, of course," Mia added. "I don't think even him would be able to beat her there."

It was amusing how, even being a portrait, Phineas's face flushed red with rage. "Oh, just wait until I…"

"… get your hands on us?" Sirius finished for him. "I'd like to see that _happen_."

"I have never seen such blunt disresp…"

"I apologize for the lateness," Dumbledore interrupted him, stepping into the room in a rush. "The centaurs seemed to believe they spotted suspicious presences on the boundaries of the forest last night. I had to go check for myself."

"Did you find anything?" Sirius inquired, worried, receiving a head shake in return.

"If there was indeed someone there, they were careful not to leave leads behind. I've reached an agreement with the centaurs, though, and they'll allow me to stretch the school wards so they cover all their territory. That, I believe, will narrow the chances of any undesirable individual managing to infiltrate Hogwarts through the forbidden forest," the headmaster explained, taking a seat on the grand chair behind the desk, resting his hands on its surface.

"Albus, your hand!" Mia said, staring at the corpse like aspect that the headmaster's hand seemed to be presenting. The product of a curse? She'd never seen anything like that. "Holy Merlin, what happened? It doesn't look good."

Dumbledore sighed. "A simple moment of recklessness. I'm afraid the damage is permanent, though not painful at the moment." He gave her the shadow of a smile. "There's no need for you to worry about it, Amelia. It's under control."

He cleared his throat, clearly hinting that he didn't want to keep discussing the subject – the only thing Mia could do was accepting it.

"Well," he started, "though this wasn't really the reason why I asked you to come, I'll use the occasion to tell you that I had a meeting with Minister Bones concerning this new school year. She seems to be worried about the effects that Cornelius's refusal to allow us to teach the students defence last year will have on their ability to protect themselves."

"She's not the only one," Sirius assured him. "If it wasn't for the DA, Fudge and Umbridge might as well just have handed those kids to the Death Eaters on a silver platter."

"Actually," the headmaster started, "Madam Bones expressed a lot of interest in the DA as her niece, Susan, told her quite a bit about it. She seems to believe it may be a good way to make up for the lack of practical DADA last year."

Mia raised an eyebrow. "Wait. Do you mean she wants to bring the DA back?"

"In a way, yes," Dumbledore confirmed. "Madam Bones suggested we adapted it to a more permanent status as a defence club open to students of all houses. She thinks that would be a good way to incite the students to know how to protect themselves. I'm still not certain of how it will work but I'm inclined to follow with it."

"Well, for the record, I think it is a really good idea," Mia pointed out.

"A good idea? It's bloody brilliant!" Sirius said, grinning widely. "The kids will love it."

"Yes, Minerva thinks so too. I will work with her to settle things for the formation of this club."

"But was this what you meant by the 'extra-curricular activities' you referred in your letter, Albus?" Mia inquired.

"Oh, not quite, actually," the older man told them, his face taking a more serious expression. "I'd better get to the point, then. I'd promised young Harry when we told him about the prophecy that I'd help him get ready to face lord Voldemort, in case you don't recall it."

Both Sirius and Mia nodded silently.

"Well, I believe I should start doing so as soon as the school term starts – we are not in a position to waste time. I thought of doing so in the form of, let's say… private lessons. Not too often so it won't interfere with his school schedule or even the time with his friends. There are some pieces of knowledge that I think Harry should be familiar with. Dark pieces, I'm afraid, that I can't tell you of at the moment with absolute certainty – I'll need Harry's help to verify my suspicions. I wouldn't feel comfortable to take such measures with him without your permission, of course."

Mia was the first to speak. "Honestly, at this point, we think that the more he knows, the more weapons he'll have to fight with. All you can offer him will be welcome at least from my part."

Sirius nodded in agreement. "Like Mia said, we'll pretty much go ahead with all the help we can get."

"I was hoping that would be your answer," Dumbledore stated, looking at them calmly. "I will also need another favour from Harry. It appears the person I have in mind to fill the gap in our staff this year is a bit… resistant. I have a feeling that if your godson had a word with him, he'd be a lot more approachable. It's nothing dangerous, I assure you."

Sirius shrugged. "If the kid's up to it, I don't think there's any problem."

"We'll write you back with what he says, Albus," Mia promised.

"Thank you," Dumbledore said, standing up behind the desk. "Well, I'll apologize for having bothered your plans for the day with such short notice."

"It was no trouble," Mia assured him as she and Sirius have him their hands to shake, avoiding the crippled one.

And just as they were about to leave, Dumbledore called them back and, with a serious face, told them exactly what they needed to hear. "I have much faith in your godson, as well. It's a great burden he has on his shoulders, especially on his age, but I do believe he can win." He just wished he'd be able to be there to see it…

* * *

After lunch, the gathering at the Burrow was, as always, an animated event. The voices were loud all around, mixed with laughs and the twins' antics with their products, which absolutely drove Molly Weasley mad. And even though there were nearly two dozen people crowding the Weasley home, there was still a feeling of being among family there.

"_Fred, George, don't you dare spike the sweets with your products!_" Molly Weasley shouted angrily, her hands gripping her hips in a highly threatening position after she'd spotted her sons from the corner of her eye trying to slip a bunch of wrapped sweets from their pockets into the bowl where the others were.

And as Molly warned them to stay away from the food she'd gotten together for tea, Harry and Ginny, who'd been outside by themselves for a quite a number of minutes, rejoined their friends in a corner of the living room, looking rather flushed and embarrassed.

Hermione was the first one to notice the expressions on their faces. "What happened? Why are you blushing?"

"It was hot outside," Harry said, all too quickly, blushing even further. "Warm Summer day. Nothing wrong with that."

"You were always a crappy liar," Izzy pointed out, almost casually.

"No, I'm not!"

"Oh, even I can see that's balderdash," Ron stated. "What exactly did you do?" he paused for a moment, rethinking the situation. "No, don't answer that question. I don't want to know about you guys snogging under a tree or something."

Ginny turned to glare at her brother. "Actually, we did snog _against_ the tree, not under it, but that's just details," she said just to spite him.

"I said I didn't want to hear about it!" Ron shouted as Harry forced himself to look away from his best mate, unable to face him after what Ginny had said. It was just too odd…

Hermione cleared her throat. "Well and… hum, was it the snogging that caused this… embarrassment of yours? Or did someone walk on you?"

"We weren't the ones who got walked on," Harry stated, grimly.

"We heard noises from the broom shed and went to check if a cat had gotten locked in it or something," Ginny explained, turning to Harry. "Well, it was definitely _not_ a cat."

"Who?" Izzy asked, eagerly intrigued.

"Take a wild guess," her best friend said. "If you want a hint, here's one: Phlegm."

"Bill and Fleur?" Hermione said, beating everyone else in the guessing.

"Oh, Mom would murder them if she knew," Ron said, amused. "Did they even see you there?"

"Yeah," Harry confirmed. "Bill just told us to scram and closed back the door. My guess is he went on with what they were doing."

"Well, they've just gotten engaged," Izzy pointed out. "I guess that gives them the right to celebrate."

Ginny huffed. "Celebrate my arse. Honestly, I'm starting to think that I'm damned to always find my brothers snog their girlfriends: first stupid Percy and Penelope, then Fred and Angelina during the Yule Ball and now Bill and Phlegm."

"Now, now, that's such an ugly name to call our lovely future sister-in-law, Gin-Gin," Fred mock-scolded his sister as he and his twin approached and pulled a couple of chairs to sit along with them.

"Don't call me Gin-Gin. And you say that because you moved out of the house already," Ginny told them. "You don't have to deal with her _every day_."

"Oh, well, better you than us," George said, pulling what looked like a large bottle of pumpkin juice from behind his back before he did sit down. "We're here to fulfil a very ancient tradition among the Weasleys."

"With pumpkin juice?" Izzy asked them sceptically as George conjured a glass.

"It's not pumpkin juice," Harry told her knowingly. "It's firewhiskey."

"Hiding it in a bottle of pumpkin juice was the only way to smuggle it through Mom," Fred explained, pouring a finger of the gold-tinted liquid into the glass in his brother's hand. "Like my dear brother was saying, we're fulfilling a very old Weasley tradition that says a real Weasley shall have his or her first sip of firewhiskey in his fifteenth birthday."

George nodded. "Of course, us being really nice blokes and all, we usually extend the tradition to a few friends as we did with Harry and Hermione…"

"I refused," the Hogwarts prefect added sharply. "There's a reason why the ministry establishes that underage wizards are not allowed to drink it."

He ignored her. "… and will do with one Miss Black this December," George continued, winking at his sister's best friend, whose lips curled slightly. "But for now it's our dear sister's turn," he finished, passing Ginny the glass.

"Bottoms up, Gin-Gin," Fred urged her.

She looked at them suspiciously. "This really is firewhiskey, isn't it? Not some potion that will make me blue with green dots all over?"

"Only Ogden's best," he assured her. "We'd never prank our favourite sister in her own birthday."

"I'm your only sister," she said before looking tentatively at the glass and bringing it to her lips, taking a sip. She made a face almost immediately but did take another sip before giving the glass back to George.

"Well?" he asked.

She took a moment to gather her thoughts, "It feels like I'm about to breathe fire," she concluded in a rough tone, still frowning at the feeling. "Not bad but I think I'll stick with the butterbeer for now."

"Ah, well, at least she didn't spill it all over us like _someone_," Fred said, looking at Ron accusatorily.

"You didn't tell me what it was! You just gave me the glass and told me to drink it!"

"By now you should know better than to trust anything we hand you, Ronnie," George stated.

While the twins kept on mocking their youngest brother (with Hermione intervening by pointing one more time that it was wrong to give an underage wizard firewhiskey) and Izzy's attention was unceremoniously captured by little Alex (who wanted a source of entertainment than didn't involve following Crookshanks and pulling his tail), Ginny managed to pull Harry aside so they stood near the door.

"So, what do you say? We go outside, take another walk and snog some more?" she whispered bluntly in his ear.

He raised an eyebrow. "Just how strong was that firewhiskey they gave you?"

"Not enough to get me wild. Though it gave me an urge to kiss you senseless," Ginny said. "Shall I remind that it's my birthday and keeping girlfriends happy on their birthday is one of the _must do's_ in a relationship? If you weren't the chosen one and your name didn't show up on the paper every day, I might just dump you for this and go out with Zacharias Smith. I secretly have a thing for his pratish ways."

He chuckled. "Well, we can't have that. Poor Smith deserves more than a vixen like you." Harry liked that they were able to do that – tease each other about things that might otherwise be serious matters. They knew how far they could go out of instinct – maybe it went even deeper than that. It just… fit. "I suppose I can make a sacrifice and take you out for that walk. But with a condition: I don't want to get anywhere near the broom shed."

She laughed and tugged his arm, pulling him out the door.

* * *

"Kingsley is making a lot of changes in the department," Tonks was saying as she sat on the sofa area with Remus, Sirius and Mia. "Don't get me wrong – Scrimgeour was a decent bloke, great auror, but there was just too much into bureaucracy. I spent more time filling reports than catching bad guys. That's just plain wrong."

"So much for being an auror," Sirius said with a chuckle. "Kingsley always rubbed me as a practical bloke – he was a couple of years ahead of us in Hogwarts. The legendary leader of the Gryffindor gobstones club, wasn't he, Moony?"

Remus chuckled. "It's hard to recall him that way but, yeah, he was an ace in the game. The whole club wept when he graduated."

Tonks burst into laughter. "I don't believe it," she said, turning to Mia. "Are they taking a piss out of me?"

"No, he really was the leader of the Gobstones club," Mia assured her in amusement. "Elizabeth was in it during her first and second years and – she'll deny it if you ask her – had this enormous crush on Kingsley, who, in her words, 'had the best aim she'd ever seen in her life'."

"Well, he still has a wicked aim, though with his wand," Tonks said before turning to Lupin. "You've been holding out on me, Remus. You never mentioned you had stories as fun as this one from your school years."

His lips curled slightly. "They're not as fun when I have to tell them by myself, Dora."

"Yeah, yeah, feed me with excuses," she said, rolling her eyes. "Starting tonight, I want to know every bit of dirt you have on any of my superiors. I'll make you if I have to."

"You'd do better if you asked Sirius," Remus warned her. "He's the one who memorizes every embarrassing detail of just anything."

Sirius grinned. "A bloke never knows when it comes handy," he stated. "If you did the same, you might use it to impress your woman."

_His woman,_ Remus thought, half amazed. Hard to believe sometimes…

"Well, whatever you can tell, it's welcome," Tonks said.

"I'll see what I can manage to remember," he promised calmly as he spotted the twins making their way to the table in the centre of the room and recalled he needed to talk to them. "I need to go have a word with Fred and George about their new line of products." He motioned to get up but not before Tonks grabbed his arm and pulled him down to kiss his cheek.

Sirius couldn't help noting how amusingly embarrassed his friend got when she did that. He supposed the bloke was still getting used to public displays of affection and the fact that nobody around seemed to be disturbed by them. After his friend was gone, he turned to his distant cousin and grinned. "So, when will you convince that stubborn git to tie the knot?"

"Oh, it takes patience to convince a guy like Remus to do anything," Tonks said. "And while patience isn't one of my most powerful traits, I suppose I can make an effort for him."

Mia smiled. "I can't even start to say how much happier he is with you in his life, Tonks. I feel like we should thank you. He's part of our family."

The metamorphagus's grin widened. "From what he mentioned, I should be the one thanking you guys. He mentioned how much you bugged him to get his head out of his arse."

"Always glad to bug, though I'm willing to take more extreme measures to make sure he gets a ring on his finger," Sirius admitted. "What do you say? You grab his arms, I take his legs and Mia here can bribe some ministry bloke to officiate. Before Moony can even realize what's happening, it will already be too late and you guys will be in your honeymoon."

Tonks snorted loudly. "I was hoping to get him to do that by his own free will but if he gets too bitchy about it, I may take you up on that, Sirius."

"Let's just hope that's not necessary," Mia stated, diplomatically. "He came this far on his own, after all. That's a point on his favour."

"Yeah, there's still hope for him, I guess," Sirius said before smirking at his cousin. "But the offer will remain open 'cause we all know how much of a stubborn arse he is."

Tonks shrugged. "Ah, well, he wouldn't be Remus if he was easy, would he? Lucky him I'm always up for a challenge."

**A/N: Slightly late update, I know, but the longest so far. It was hard week emotionally, really. I hope you liked the chapter anyway. Next one will likely mark the beginning of the new school year. Feeback is welcome, as always. Review!**


	6. Suspicions

In the two weeks that followed Ginny's birthday, the Death Eater attacks seemed to calm down or, at least, become less noticeable. Nevertheless, people –both Wizards and Muggles kept on disappearing and very few ended up being found, even though Kingsley had a third of the Auror Department assigned to the case. Though some of those people were bound to be on the run from the war as had happened last time around, the Order believed that number to be very small, compared to the full list of missing people.

Meanwhile, around a week before the new school year was to start, Dumbledore came to Grimmauld place and took Harry with him to help him with the mission of convincing some guy to come teach at Hogwarts, as he had requested. Hours later, when Harry came back home and mentioned to his godparents that the man in question was none other than Horace Slughorn, they were puzzled.

When told the same in the following day, Remus seemed to share the feeling. "Slughorn?" he asked Sirius.

"Yep," he confirmed as he sat on the chair in front of his old friends desk at the twins' shop. Given his dislike for clothes shopping, Sirius had been put in charge of taking care of Alex while Mia was getting new school robes for the kids with Molly Weasley and Hagrid, the latter serving as their guard.

"Are you sure?" the werewolf inquired.

"Yes, Moony," Sirius confirmed once more, giving a glance to Alex, who was sitting on the floor laughing as he waved around a talking Umbridge doll that one of the twins had handed to him downstairs. He decided the kid was doing a nice enough job distracting himself and turned his attention back to Remus. "Harry assured me the name of the teacher Dumbledore took him to meet was Slughorn and said he was a 'short, round bloke with an enormous moustache that sort of made him look like a walrus'. Oh, and he tended to gloat. Ring any bells?"

"That does sound like him," Remus mumbled, nodding in agreement as he scratched his chin. "But why would Dumbledore be hire a new Potions teacher? Unless… oh." He looked straight at Sirius. "You know what that probably means, right? Snape finally got what he wanted. He's the new…"

Sirius quickly held up a hand, interrupting him. "No, don't finish that sentence," he said. "I don't want to hear Snape and DADA with any sort of correlation. I'd rather hope that greasy git Snape finally decided he was done with Hogwarts and left, so Dumbledore had to hire Slughorn to replace him instead." He grinned at his own imagination. "Oh, yes, that would be just _brilliant_ news."

"And unlikely as well," Remus said dryly. "Dumbledore trusts Snape, Padfoot. He's not about to give up a teacher he trusts on to welcome back one he likely hasn't heard of for years and likely someone else, seeing as in that in the 'hopeful' situation you mentioned there would be one more vacant position at Hogwarts."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Don't care. You always were too damn smart for your own good. Just let me live the dream, Moony," he said, leaning against the back of the chair and closing his eyes to imagine it better.

"You know, one would think you'd have grown out of wishing Snape all the horror in the world by the time you were married and with kids," Remus stated, shaking his head at Sirius's dreamy mood.

"Oh, but I'm not wishing him horror this time," he replied. "No, I'm wishing him the best… just as long as the best is far, far away from me, of course. I can just picture it: Snape went on vacation over the Summer Break, met a woman – a very blind or very tasteless woman – and decides to settle down in Russia… No, not Russia. It isn't far away enough. They'll relocate to the Australian desert, become hermits, have a whole litter of greasy haired little spawns and never again return to this little place called Britain. The End."

The werewolf sighed. "Yes, a tear-jerking story, Padfoot. Let me guess, you're the one who makes up the bedside stories for Alex."

Sirius glanced at his little son playing on the floor and grinned. "Mia does help from time to time. Just last night, we were telling him this tale about a perky, colourful princess called Dora who slayed dragons for a living and ended up falling for a knight known by the name of Sir Moony and who seriously needed to get his sense of humour back from wherever he'd left it."

"You've just made that up," Remus pointed out. "And my sense of humour is just where it belongs, thank you. Fact remains that, despite that very interesting story of yours, Sirius, odds are that Snape got the position of DADA teacher. Have you mentioned that to your kids already? Because, if I recall it well, he had a rather obvious dislike for both of them and DADA happens to be Harry's favourite subject."

Sirius stood up, sick of being sat down. "As a matter of fact, Moony, I did tell them and they're with me, obviously, crossing their fingers for Snape to have moved to the moon. At least Slughorn is a better potions master than that git." He reached down and picked up Alex, who'd already gotten to his feet and was protesting for his father's attention.

"And what does Mia think about him being back?"

His face fell a little. "She got really emotional. Not about him, of course. About Lily. She used to be his favourite, remember? Mia just burst into tears when Harry told us the things Slughorn had said about Lily – the usual stuff: great student, wonderful person… It probably has something to do with those mad pregnancy hormones too but, Merlin, she cried on my shoulder for like half an hour. I didn't even know what to tell her."

"Sometimes I forget we weren't the only ones who lost a best friend," Remus murmured.

"Lily was as much of a sister to Mia and to Elizabeth as James was a brother to us." A short period of silence followed his words. It was bittersweet thinking of them – what was and what could have been. They had to live with that.

A delighted squeal had them snapping out of it to see that Alex was holding the Umbridge doll by a leg, spinning it around. The doll kept on protesting, citing fake ministry decrees and threatening detentions in a squeaky voice that disappeared every few seconds, not to mention turning purple and red with rage, while the little boy waved it around, highly amused. At some point Alex launched it against the sofa and the miniature Umbridge ended up with its head stuck between the couch cushions. "Bad!"

Sirius snorted at that. "That's my boy. Such a great judge of character in such a young age."

"Rebelling early, I see," Remus observed, taking a moment to observe his godson's delight before going on with their conversation, taking a more good-natured tone this time. "You know, I'm confident Albus would be more than welcome to clarify your doubts over Snape's job situation, in case you asked him. That way, you might avoid unpleasant surprises."

"Not a chance, Moony. As long as I don't ask, I can hold on to the threads of my wonderful fantasy of a Snape-less Hogwarts," Sirius stated with a grin.

"Well, are you poetic today… not to mention procrastinating," Moony declared.

"Says the king of procrastinators, if that word even exists," Sirius countered, turning to his son. "Can you say how many months it took Uncle Moony to get his hands on Auntie Tonks, mate?"

The toddler gave him a confused look and just pointed at Remus, giggling. "Moooy!"

"That was not procrastinating, Padfoot. That was thinking things thoroughly. Regular people do it a lot."

"Call it what you want. Took you too damn long," Sirius said just as someone knocked on the door and Tonks poked her head in. "And speaking of the devil…"

"Wotcher, guys," the metamorphagus greeted them in a tone as colourful as her pink hair before she turned to Sirius. "Mia's downstairs looking for you."

"Mama?" little Alex asked as he heard his mother's name but couldn't see her anywhere. He looked at his father with an inquisitive look in his little face. "Whew Mama?"

"Downstairs, mate," Sirius told him with a chuckle. "Daddy will take you there."

"I thought you were on all-day service today," Remus pointed out to Tonks.

She nodded, stepping into the room. "I am. There was a change of plans and Kingsley assigned me to Diagon Alley. Dawlish is covering for me and it's time for lunch, so I thought I could come by."

"Ah, that's sweet," Sirius teased as he walked closer to the door, summoning the Umbridge doll back to Alex on his way there. "Well, the wife's looking for you, so Alex and I won't stand on the way of your booty call. Have fun kids!"

Remus's face paled immediately. "This is not a booty…" But before he could finish, Sirius was already out the door and had it closed behind him.

"Uncle Moony's getting frisky," Sirius told his son as he carried him down the stairs. "Or at least auntie Tonks is making him."

"Fikky?" the little boy asked, confused.

"Ah, nevermind. I've got to stop saying this kind of stuff around you or your mom will kill me." The sounds in shop were filled with laughter and, from time to time, surprised shouts, caused by some of the products. As he stepped in it from the stairs, it took him several scans around the room to spot his wife standing by a group of her Hogwarts students, who were greeting her, likely glad to have an actual human teacher instead of an undead one back in their classes. He grinned and pushed his way through the crowd in order to reach them. "Mrs. Black," he said as the students spread around the room.

Mia turned around, raising an eyebrow at the greeting. "Mr. Black," she replied in amusement before looking at her son and reaching to brush his dark hair away from his eyes. "And little Mr. Black."

"Up, Mama," the little boy giggled, reaching for her with his arms.

She smiled and picked her son up carefully, holding him on her hip. He stilled in her arms immediately, resting his head against her shoulder. Sometimes, it was like he knew he had to be careful around his mother and, especially, 'the baby in the bump', as Sirius usually referred it to Alex. Her smart little boy, Mia thought, kissing his brow. She looked up at Sirius. "Well, did you have fun while we were out shopping for school robes?"

"I can't complain," he said. "Did I miss anything out there?"

"Not really," she said with a bored shrug. But suddenly, it like something just came to her. "Actually… remember how you noticed Ollivander's was closed and had its windows covered with broadsheets?"

"Yeah. Kind of weird. I don't remember the bloke ever remodelling that place. It looks like it's been exactly the same for the past two or three centuries."

"Well, he isn't remodelling this time either," Mia informed him. "See, while the kids were trying on their school robes, Molly and I ended up talking along with Madam Malkin and when we brought up Ollivander's, she told us what happened. Apparently, just last night the shop was attacked and Mr. Ollivander just… vanished."

"Death Eaters? How come the Order wasn't called?"

"From what she said, nobody heard anything at all. They only found the store completely trashed around seven this morning – that's why it didn't show up in the paper or anything because they couldn't have had the time to write anything. Apparently, the aurors are still there."

"Hum, so that's probably why Tonks is around…" Sirius mumbled.

Mia nodded. "It doesn't seem a random attack at all, does it?"

"Whoever did it, was careful enough not to call attention and to cover after themselves." He shook his head, closing his hands in fists to relieve the stress. "Damn it, it's like people are vanishing every week! Is this ever going to end?" His voice raised in frustration when he said that last part.

She clutched her son closer and remained silent, waiting for Sirius to calm down again. She could tell when he needed a moment just to think – this was one of these times. At some point, when she saw he was doing better, one of her hands rubbed his forearm as the other held Alex and finally looked her in the eyes.

"Sorry about the explosion," he whispered.

"It's okay. You deal with my mood swings all too frequently, so I'd say we're even."

"Mom, Dad," they heard their daughter's voice coming from nearby. She appeared by their side less than a second later. "Fred and George asked if we wanted to stay here and help around after lunch. This place is too crowded even for them. Can we stay?"

"Oh, you and Ginny?" Mia asked.

"With Harry, Ron and Hermione if they want to," she said. "Can we? Please? We don't have anything else to do back home."

Mia looked at Sirius, who gave her a shrug and answered for both of them. "Sure, why not?"

"Just don't stay too late and have Remus take you and Harry home," Mia added.

"And speaking of him, where is he?" Sirius asked, suddenly curious.

"Around, probably," she said, not completely honestly. She wasn't sure where Harry was exactly but she knew what he'd been doing for the past ten minutes… which was following Malfoy around with Ron and Hermione after they'd spotted him acting funny. She and Ginny would be with him if it wasn't for the fact that they didn't fit under the invisibility cloak… "I should go. The twins are waiting for an answer," she excused herself.

Still, not even the quick exit had kept Sirius from guessing she was hiding something. And it was probably related to the fact that the shop's door opened minutes later and 'nobody' seemed to come in. He'd been under James's invisibility cloak too many times in his Hogwarts years to blame _that_ on the wind. He made a point not to mention his suspicions to Mia, though, knowing she'd have fit over it and, after all, there was a solidarity code among followers of the art of sneaking out…

"Well, I guess I'll go get the kids so we can go get some lunch," he told Mia, using it as an excuse to go have a little word with Harry.

Mia, who'd been sharing some relaxed baby talk with her son, looked up at him and nodded. "Okay, I'll be waiting here," she agreed as she leaned closer to him and had him reaching down for a soft kiss on the lips.

"I'll try not to take long," he promised, walking his way to the corner, secluded from most people's views by the flight of steps covering it, from where he saw Harry, Ron and Hermione emerge, visible this time around. It was like as soon as his godson laid eyes on him, he knew Sirius was aware of his little trip. "Had a nice walk?"

Harry nodded back at the corner, knowing they probably shouldn't have that conversation in front of everyone. They all retreated to that space under the stairs, Sirius giving his godson an inquiring look. "Well?"

"We followed Malfoy," Harry confessed. "I know we shouldn't have but he was acting really odd. We needed to know…"

"I'm not here to scold you, kid, though there are better ways of handling that sort of thing. What did you guys find out?"

This time, Hermione was the one to talk. "Well… he went to Borgin and Burke's. It's this really sinister shop…"

"In Knockturn Alley," Sirius finished, turning to Harry. That part, as much as he tried, he couldn't be okay about. "You went into _Knockturn Alley_? Just the three of you? Are you _mad_? That's the most dangerous magical place you could possibly find in London!"

"We were under the Invisibility Cloak. Nobody saw us," he replied.

"Still, Harry! I'm fine with a little sneaking out, I really am. Merlin knows I did that myself a lot but you can't get yourself straight into places like _Knockturn Alley_," Sirius told him seriously. "If someone found you there…" He shook his head, trying not to think of what would happen. "I know I don't exactly have the best record on cautiousness but, for Merlin's sake, you can't risk your life like _that_. Any of you. If your godmother even imagined you went to that place…"

"Okay, okay," Harry agreed. He knew it took a lot to have Sirius show worry like that. "I won't go back there. I promise I won't."

"_We_ promise," Hermione added, Ron nodding by her side.

Sirius let out a breath. "Well, fine… What did you find out, then?"

"He was talking to the clerk, Borgin, I think, about fixing something, something he couldn't take to the shop. I have no idea what it was," Harry told him. "And the he threatened the guy in case he told someone – he said he'd send in some bloke to handle things if he said something and when Borgin heard his name, he got really frightened." He turned to his friends. "What was he called? I can't remember it."

"Greyvle…" Ron said, not completely sure. "No, Greyback. I think it was Greyback."

Sirius froze immediately. The first time he'd heard that name, was when he was sixteen and James had managed to smuggle a couple of bottles of firewhiskey into the school during Easter break. That night, he and the guys had gotten _really_ drunk in their dorm – drunk enough never to do something like that again, just to avoid a hangover like the one they'd had to deal with in the morning after. But that night was also the first time Remus had felt loose enough to tell them exactly how he'd been turned into a werewolf: how his father had unknowingly offended a werewolf called Fenrir Greyback, how the sick bastard had gotten himself close to him on purpose during full moon and how he'd turned him. Despite being completely smashed that night, none of the marauders – or, at least, neither he nor James – had ever forgotten that name or what he'd done to one of them. Hearing that name again, knowing _he_ was tagging along with the Death Eaters, only made the whole thing more unsettling, more vicious.

"You know who he is," Harry said, identifying the recognition in his eyes.

"You don't want to cross paths with that guy," Sirius told them shortly – he'd leave it for Remus to tell them more if he wanted to. "I'll warn the Order, okay? I'll make sure they know what you saw. And if you see something odd like this again – I mean see, not go look for – tell me, okay?"

Harry nodded. "I will." He knew Sirius, of all people, would believe him.

"Do you think Malfoy may be up to something?" Hermione inquired.

"If he's anything like his parents, I wouldn't be surprised if he was, honestly," his godfather stated. "But then again, I may be wrong." He sighed. "Let's just get to Mia before she starts wondering what we're doing."

"You won't tell her, will you?" Harry asked, nervously. "About us going to Knockturn Alley. She'd have my hide. I'll be washing dishes for the rest of my life."

He looked as horrified by the thought of her reaction as Harry did. "And deal with the hormonal rampage when she found out that I didn't ground you for it? I'll try to leave that part out, don't worry. I'd rather keep my skin as well."

* * *

Several days after Sirius informed the Order of what Harry had witnessed, there was still no word on Greyback, which had Sirius both worried and relieved. Even if he'd like to know of his enemy's whereabouts, no news was better than any news…

In the first day of September, when Sirius and Mia arrived to Platform 9 ¾ fifteen minutes ahead of time and with no fuss whatsoever that morning, she couldn't help finding it amazingly odd.

The morning of the first of September was, ever since she'd first taken Harry to the Hogwarts Express five years before, marked in her calendar as the equivalent to a civil revolution: there was confusion, yelling, rush… though, luckily, there were no fatalities. Between misplaced wands and last minute packing, she usually ended that morning glad that the following one was yet a year away.

That time, by the instant she'd woken up – two hours after she'd planned, for her own panic – the kids, who she'd expected to be shouting on the hallway and asking where something or other was, were calmly having breakfast, their trunks unbelievably packed and resting by the fireplace and Alex was already dressed and fed, ready to be taken to Lulu for the day. Tough Sirius hadn't said a word or hinted it, Mia had a feeling he'd been the mind behind that 'bizarre' occurrence, likely with Kreacher's help.

The Weasleys arrived and joined them a few minutes later, surprisingly bringing the twins along with them to the station.

"We could never miss our first chance to see off our beloved younger siblings and friends while knowing we're not going anywhere, could we?" Fred stated after he and his twin were inquired by Izzy about they was doing there.

George nodded. "We brought white handkerchiefs to wave at you guys – they give a whole new dramatic degree to the situation."

"I bet you guys spent years waiting for this," Izzy said dryly.

"Of course we were. I mean, don't take this the wrong way – we loved Hogwarts and we had a blast there. Our future just wasn't compatible with full-time education," he explained.

"Not compatible…" Molly grumbled under her breath, having heard them. "Didn't even take your NEWTs! If that joke shop hadn't made it through, you'd be disgraced!"

As the discussion followed from there with Molly protesting some more and unsuccessfully begging her sons to just go take their exams, Mia stood a few feet away, observing the platform around her.

There were aurors everywhere, some indentified as such, others dressed to mingle with the crowd. Their presence only seemed to identify the feeling of uneasiness that hung over everyone's heads. Still, the same way she and Sirius struggled to keep things as normal as possible around their home and family, she could see other people fighting to keep normalcy too: by one of the train's entrance's, Neville's grandmother was fussing with the collar of his shirt, making him look incredibly embarrassed; nearby, Luna Lovegood stood kissing her father's cheek goodbye before boarding the train; finally, by another entrance, Seamus Finnigan was being hugged tightly by a short blonde woman that Mia assumed to be his mother, as his father stood grinning by their side, holding in his arms a little girl with dark blond hair who looked about the same age as Alex. They were all fighting back, or at least, not letting themselves be defeated by the fear around.

A pair of arms surrounded her waist suddenly, resting their hands on her belly. "Knut for your thoughts?" Sirius's voice filled her ears.

"Hum, they're not worth that much," she replied, smiling to herself as kissed her cheek from behind. "It's just sentimental rubbish. I could kiss you to make up for the lack of decent thought but I think that's worth a little more than a knut."

"Name a price, Madam. I'll see what I can arrange."

She turned around to face him and smiled as his arms still circled her. "You know what? I think you can get them for free this time. After all, you were so nice and took care of everything so the kids leaving wouldn't make a mess like it always does…"

"Anything to protect my beloved wife and my baby from a bomb of stress like that one," he replied. "I believe we were talking about payment…"

"I didn't say I'd do it now, did I?" she said. "It would just be shameful for two respected teachers like us to kiss in front of all these students. Spoil their innocent minds…"

"You're a cruel, cruel woman," he informed her dramatically.

"Yes, I'm a wicked witch," she confirmed with a smirked, pulling away as both Izzy and Harry approached to say their goodbyes.

The two of them stood with them, talking for a few minutes as they waited for Ginny to finish her farewells with her family so they could go find a compartment on the train together, while Ron and Hermione would be attending a prefect meeting.

"It's going to suck if Snape does turn out as the new DADA teacher," Harry told his godfather while Mia spoke with Izzy. "If I even had a chance to ever make an auror without potions, then I'll be doomed with DADA now…"

Sirius shook his head. "If you made it with Umbridge, you'll be fine with Snape. Better the devil you know, isn't it? Besides, I have a feeling you'll have something else to fill your defence needs…"

"Something else?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "Is that some sort of hint about Ginny?"

"Unless you're planning to duel with her instead of snogging, I don't think she would apply to satisfaction of defence needs. Look, I'm not even supposed to be telling you this but Dumbledore's planning to sort of turn the DA into a more… curricular subject."

His face lit up suddenly. "Really?"

"Really. It probably won't be the same as it was but I guess it will be more than nothing. Can't say more than that. Just, please, can you try to look surprise when he announces it during the fest?" Harry gave it a try and faked a surprised look. Sirius raised his eyebrows. "Hum, maybe you should keep training it on the train."

"Hey!"

"Don't worry, James was almost as bad as you. He couldn't keep a straight face while lying," he said with a snort before noticing on the clock that it was almost time to board the train. "Now, because I'm a really great godfather, I'll tell you that the guys at the train keep the key for the luggage compartment hidden in the lamp just by the passage to it. That happens to be a very useful place for certain activities such as snogging that pretty redhead that's coming in our direction." He patted Harry's shoulder before motioning to go join Mia again. "Use that knowledge well, kid."

The goodbyes that followed were quick, considering they'd be seeing each other again just that night, unlike the other parents, and the kids quickly hoped into the train, waving at them from the windows. Like promised, the twins soon stood by the train, waving white handkerchiefs and wiping fake tears as their mother scolded them for mocking the others.

As they watched the train leave, Mia's hand linked to her husband's. "Let's hope this is _just_ another year."

Sirius knew the odds of that happening were minimal at that rate, yet, he didn't say that out loud. Maybe luck would be on their side that time around – he wouldn't want to jinx it. "Yeah, let's hope."

**A/N: Hey, guys sorry for the delay but I had a busy day because, well, it's my birthday (I've just reached the wonderful twenties) and I had a birthday party to plan... I hope you liked the chapter. I basically deleted half of it the day before yesterday and wrote it all over again... Feedback is welcome, as always. Review!**


	7. Protectiveness

Still in the first of September, it wasn't until she'd stepped back into her classroom at Hogwarts after lunch that Mia realized how much she'd missed that place… They said home was where the heart was, where a person was happy. She was happy teaching – loved doing it, even – so she supposed that, in a way, that classroom was a little bit of home…

She hated Umbridge for having taken it away from her in the previous year. Even more so for having her replaced by _Binns_, who certain had a lot of knowledge about history but had no idea of how to pass it along to his students without boring them to death. _She's gone now_, Mia reminded herself. And thanks to Amelia Bones's intervention, not to mention Dumbledore's, Dolores Umbridge was condemned to spend the rest of her career filling archives in the lowest levels of the Ministry of Magic. She could just picture those pink and green outfits of hers covered with the dust and spiders that were famed to live down there.

Mia let out a breath. That dark period was over and, even though other shadows were more than keen to replace that one, she selfishly wished they'd just stay far away from her and her loved ones… at least for now, as she knew fate had other plans for Harry, at least. In the following day, that room would be full of students and she had other things to worry about instead of that bloody war.

Quickly deciding to start out with setting up her office, she made her way into it through the door that connected both the History of Magic classroom to the respective teacher's private quarters. The lack of dust in it told her the house-elves had been doing their job cleaning it but, other than that, there was no sign whatsoever of it ever being used in months as everything, from the desk lamp to the cushions on the sofa, rested exactly where she'd left it. She had no idea how a ghost handled its daily life… or death, as it was the case. Apparently, it didn't involve any sort of interaction with furniture.

"Where do you want me to leave these?" Sirius asked her as he stepped into the room, carrying the boxes where all the possessions she'd needed to remove from her office after being fired by Umbridge were contained.

"Just put them on the floor so they won't get in the way of things," she said.

He managed to give her a quick nod as he balanced the boxes before placing them on the floor as she'd said. "Well, where do you want me to start?" he asked.

She raised an eyebrow. "Don't you have your own office to set up?"

"It's fine, I can do that later," he told her with a shrug. "I'll just stick around here and help you."

Mia frowned. "It's just a bunch of books, frames and small stuff. I can perfectly take care of this on my own."

"Yeah, but some of them are pretty heavy for you. I mean, that collection about the Troll wars… each book is huge and most weight nearly as much as Alex. A pregnant woman lifting the boxes up and putting all these books in the bookcases…"

"I'll be using magic so that won't be a problem," she said, edgily.

"Well, yeah, but magic can wear you out too…"

Her eyes turned into dangerously narrow slits. _Not the 'you're pregnant so you're essentially made of glass' business again,_ she thought. Did everyone believe she was completely ignorant? She'd been a healer – she knew her limits. No need to act completely condescending! "Sirius, if you know what's best for you, you'll stop talking now and get out of this room because you're just digging yourself a bigger and bigger hole…"

"But…" His eyes widened when he saw her wand in her hand – she wasn't going to curse him, was she? If that was the case, those damn hormones had just taken a turn for life-threatening when it came to him. To his relief, although, she didn't point her wand at him but at one of the chairs in front of her desk and, giving it a wave, instantly turned the piece of furniture into a large pumpkin. He frowned and looked up at her, wondering what had been the point of that.

"Honey," she started, dangerously. "If you don't stop acting so asinine and get lost in the next twenty seconds, your head will have the same fate as that chair!"

He opened his mouth to say something but closed it right away. _Way to piss her off_, he told himself. He was pretty sure, for a wide range of reasons, that she wouldn't actually do it. Yet, he wouldn't want to test her on that. Maybe that threat might be his cue to leave… He raised his arms up in defeat. "Okay, okay. I'm going. Just don't push yourself…"

"_Out_!" she ordered loudly. He was quick in making his way out of the door, leaving her alone in the office to sulk.

She'd married an idiot. Well, maybe not an idiot but at least a git. A git she was in love with but who could just drive her mad sometimes. Like that one, she thought as she sat down on the sofa, arms crossed against her chest in irritation. She had to be mad to even consider turning someone's head into a pumpkin. It was just ridiculous! If he'd pushed her hard enough, though, she might've gone looking for a way to shove one into his head without actually hurting him – it was just for the ridicule, after all…

Annoyed, she wasted all the energy she'd gotten from the frustration into putting away all her stuff from the boxes, even without bothering to stand up from that couch. As if she wouldn't think of reducing the largest books' size before levitating them into place and them restore them to the normal size. She was pregnant, not completely demented! Distracted, she accidentally let the ink set fly against the wall, leaving there a large black stain. _Damn it!_

"You know, your father is an _overprotective prat_," Mia told her unborn baby, half-heartedly, as she waved her wand around. If she was completely honest to herself, not only being annoyed made her productive, seeing as fifteen minutes after starting putting her things away she was already finished, but also being productive helped her getting over the annoyance. At least a little of it…

Her baby seemed to agree with her statement, since she felt that soft sensation of movement inside her bump – if she didn't know it better, she'd say there were butterflies flying loose in it. But no, that was her baby stating its unspoken opinion – it had been moving around a bit lately, though it wasn't strong enough to feel from the outside yet.

If there was any irritation still inside her at that moment, it had faded thanks to her unborn son or daughter. She smiled and got up, rubbing her belly as she started walking around. "I know you agree, honey." She sighed. "He was much worse when it was your brother in there, you know? Mummy couldn't take a step without him following around. Silly guy, isn't he?"

The movements continued for a few more seconds before slowly fading away – she assumed the baby had gone back to sleep or just gotten fed up of moving around. "I suppose I can give him a little break because he loves us all so much, can't I?" Mia paused. "Do you think Mummy overreacted too much by kicking Daddy out?"

"I doubt he'll hold it against you," a voice said behind her.

Startled, Mia turned around all of a sudden to see McGonagall standing by the doorway, her lips curled into a rare smile. "Oh, it's you, Minerva. Come on in."

"I didn't mean to startle you," the professor said, apologetically.

Mia shook her head. "It's no problem. Now, you must think I'm mad, talking to myself…"

"I was under the impression you were talking to your child, not yourself. And I believe that is quite normal among pregnant women," McGonagall said, stepping into the office. "I was wondering if you needed some help out here but it looks like you handled everything on your own…"

She raised a suspicious eyebrow. "Sirius didn't ask you to come here, did he?"

"Not that I recall," the older teacher promised her with a smile. "To tell the truth, I'm not really used to being around pregnant co-workers – it makes me feel rude not to come by and offer a hand to you."

Mia sighed and sat down behind her desk and waved her hand at the chair opposite her that still looked like a chair. "Please, take a seat, Minerva. Now, I feel rude for asking that at all. It's just he gets so protective sometimes and it's… well, it's frustrating."

McGonagall nodded, giving a confused look to the pumpkin resting beside the chair she was directed to and opting ask about it later. She cleared her throat. "I can relate, actually. Just after I came back from St. Mungo's a few months ago after that… _incident_ when I got stunned by multiple sources while _Dolores_ tried to get Hagrid shooed out of this school, everyone seemed to believe I couldn't walk around this school without an escort – I even had a house elf following me around! Just imagine how ludicrous the situation was!"

She chuckled heartedly at the thought. "Oh, I don't think Sirius would've gone that far," Mia mumbled. "Maybe I was a little too hard on him by kicking him out…" She pointed at the pumpkin resting just by the side or her teacher's chair. "That used to be a chair a few hours ago. I threatened to do the same with Sirius's head – I don't think I'd have done it, though. It would be just mental."

Genuinely amused, McGonagall let out a joyous laugh and Mia couldn't help thinking that she didn't remember her old teacher ever laughing like that. "I don't think I'd ever heard a threat as creative as that one. Involving transfiguration, no less. And, technically speaking, I believe you'd have succeeded in turning that threat into a reality if you wanted you," McGinagall continued. "You always were quite talented in my class."

"I liked transfiguration. Not as much as James, though," she let out a long breath, thinking of the past. "Do you know he was the brains behind the Marauders becoming Animagi?"

McGonagall let out a huff, then. "I thought so when Albus told me of it. If I'd known it back then… honestly, I'm not sure if I'd have him and your husband on detention for the rest of their lives or proposed their names for some sort of achievement prize. I never knew if I should be fascinated or appalled with half the trouble they came up with." The teacher shook her head in disapproval. "Quite a handful, they were. I dare say the only ones that were able to reach their level were the Weasley twins." And had she been proud of the way they'd stood up to Umbridge the previous year and completely humiliated her with their explosive exit of the school…

"They're doing very well with their shop," Mia told her with a smile.

The other woman nodded. "Yes, I saw so myself. I couldn't help dropping by to see it when I went to Diagon Alley, check what I should expect seeing in the students' hands this year…" And, once more, she'd been guiltily impressed by their success. "Well, I think we can expect plenty of trouble related to Weasley products. Argus has already pined their whole catalogue in his banned-items list."

"And since when did that ever stop anyone?" Mia asked sceptically. "Anyway, considering the lack of enjoyment that there was last year with Umbridge, I don't think that the students using Weasley products every now and then will be too bad, actually."

"Seen from that point of view, maybe not," McGonagall offered. "I usually make an effort not to despise fellow teachers but that woman…" she didn't finish her sentence but the narrowing of her eyes said enough on themselves. She sighed. "I was genuinely relieved when Albus told me he'd managed to hire Horace back. He may have his strange habits, yes, but at least he's proven his trust to us plenty of times already."

Mia agreed. "So, Snape is really taking over DADA, isn't he?" she asked. "Sirius has been feeding this little fantasy that Snape had gotten married, quit his job, and moved out of the country… please don't ask for details, it was a really bizarre scenario."

The teacher raised her eyebrows. "Well, I can assure you Severus is indeed taking over the position of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher and certainly not planning to move out of the country anytime soon. As for getting married, I haven't heard of anything of that sort." She shook her head in disbelief. "Honestly, I'd like to know where Sirius gets that imagination from."

"That makes two of us – this was just his way of convincing himself he wouldn't have to deal with Snape this year, actually. You know how they are, Minerva."

The older teacher nodded knowingly. "Yes, it's like they become hostile toddlers when they're face to face. Severus wasn't too keen about having Sirius back in the school either. He even suggested we ended the position of Quidditch Coach for good as Umbridge had – Albus took it as a joke, of course."

Mia saw the reference to Dumbledore as a good opportunity to enquire McGonagall about something that she'd been worried (and curious) about ever since she'd last seen the headmaster. "Minerva, do you have any idea of what happened to Albus's…"

"… hand?" McGonagall finished for her, her face tensing slightly. "You're not the first one to ask. I have no idea. He's been evading everyone's questions about it and won't even let Poppy check the hand…"

"No? But he said he'd had it checked – I'd assumed it would have been Madam Pomfrey."

"Not this time," McGonagall said. "He just keeps assuring us that whatever happened to the hand, it's under control."

"It doesn't look good, though. It seems… dead. The hand, I mean," Mia clarified. "It looks like the hand of a corpse. I worked for over ten years as a healer and I never saw anything like that, Minerva."

"Poppy told me the same and she's been on the job for over thirty years."

"It looks like the product of a curse – a very powerful and dark one, I'd say," Mia said. "Are you sure he didn't get this in a battle? It might've happened in the Department of Mysteries and remained dormant for a while."

McGonagall shook her head. "I wasn't there, so I wouldn't be able to tell. As for any battle after that, I don't recall him ever being hit by any spell. I suppose we'll just have to keep on trusting Albus's words until he decides to clarify us further even if we don't like it." The deputy headmistress sighed, then, standing up. "Well, it was lovely talking to you again, Mia, but if you don't need my help here, after all, I should go down to the kitchens and oversee things."

Mia stood up as well and gave McGonagall a nod. "Of course. Thanks for offering the help, anyway. I won't keep you any longer."

And as McGonagall made her way out of the room, Mia sank back into her chair, unsure of what to do. She didn't feel like sulking anymore. In fact, she felt more like dropping by Sirius's office and pay him a little visit. Maybe apologize for her earlier outburst as well if he showed he was sorry for being an overprotective arse…

"What do you say, baby? Do you want to go pay Daddy a visit?" she asked, looking down at her bump, which didn't show any sign of response. "Not feeling like answering, are you? Well, Mummy's gonna take that as a 'yes'."

* * *

When the knock on the door caught his attention, Sirius had been sitting in his small office, leaning against the back of the chair he was balancing backwards. His feet were propelled on the desk in front of him while he indulgently read about the winnings of the Tornados on _Quidditch Monthly_. Before telling whoever had knocked to come in, he quickly straightened himself on the chair, removed his feet from the table and put down the magazine– far from him risking one of his old teachers finding him in the position he'd been on. That would just be weird.

However, Mia was the one stepping into the room instead. He took a second to evaluate the expression on her face, trying to gather whether she was still angry or not. He couldn't really hold her outburst against her – after thinking for a few minutes, he realized he'd been pretty insistent about staying there and helping her. Maybe annoyingly so. And that added with the hormonal outbursts was explosive. But, looking at her, he quickly recognized the calmer look in her eyes as she stood there by the door and concluded she wasn't there for a second round of shouting.

"Hi," she said, almost awkwardly. "Do you have a little time for me?"

Before answering, he stood up and made his way to her. "All the time in the world," he assured her, offering a smile. His hands reached for hers as he approached her. "Does you being here mean I'm forgiven for my earlier 'overprotective prat-ness'?"

She raised an eyebrow at him. "Were you listening when I called you that?"

"Not really, but you usually call me names along those lines when you're angry at me."

"I wasn't angry. I was just…" she sighed, letting her hands go of his, "having a tantrum, I guess." No, that wasn't the right word. Tantrum. It made her sound like an annoyed four-year-old. "Well, maybe I was a little angry."

He chuckled. "A little?"

She sighed. "I overreacted. I'm sorry. But you can't just go all… patronizing on me, okay? It's annoying."

"I didn't mean to make it sound patronizing, Mia," Sirius said apologetically. "I really didn't."

Mia nodded, accepting his words. "And I didn't mean to jump on your throat like that either. I did want to kick you out, though."

He snorted. "You get points for the honesty."

"And for the record," Mia added with a little glint of gloating in her eyes, "I put everything away in less than fifteen minutes and didn't get even a little tired. Mostly because I was still running on fumes from being pissed off at you, by the way."

Sirius laughed. "Well, why don't we call it a tie this time around then?"

Mia smiled. "A tie would be just fine. And for the record, I promise I wasn't actually planning to turn your head into any sort of vegetable anytime soon," she added.

"I had a feeling you weren't," he confessed. One of his hands reached up to cup her cheek as the other rested on the side of her bump. "You love me too much to do that." His face broke into a wider and more playful grin, then, as he decided it was time to add some banter to their conversation. "Besides, it would be sort of difficult to snog a pumpkin, wouldn't it? With the lack of lips and all. You love snogging me too much to give it up."

She raised a defiant eyebrow at him. "Don't be so sure of that. Push the wrong buttons and you'll see."

"You're saying you could spend, let's say, two weeks without snogging me even though you see me everyday?" he dared her, hoping she wouldn't take him up on it. The competitive streak on him was just too strong for him to stay quiet.

"Well, I bet I could give it up for a while if I tried."

"Are you sure?" he asked, leaning even closer to her, less than one inch apart, testing her on purpose.

She could actually feel his breath against hers and it made her feel… Merlin, it made her feel on fire. She wanted to kiss him. Hard. Why did he have to do that when she was trying to prove a point? It was on purpose, obviously.

"Well?" he insisted.

"You're an arse," she whispered, accepting her defeat and giving in. Her lips were on his moments later, passionate and demanding, making Sirius groan in triumph. He didn't disappoint her, responding in the same tone as his hand cupped her face.

He still made her knees go weak when he kissed her, even though they'd been together so long. That was one of the reasons why she'd never be able to win that dare of his. And his hands always touched her so softly, almost reverently. He knew exactly what she liked and where she liked it. More and more reasons for her not to win popped in her head as his lips passionately kissed hers but the most important of all was a constant: because she loved him more than words could say and so did he.

She grabbed the hem of his shirt and gave it a pull, silently urging him to kiss her even more fiercely, which he immediately complied, wrapping his arm around her form harder and pulling her closer. That sent waves of heat all over her body.

At some point, he pulled away slightly so they could catch their breaths back and she immediately felt at loss. "Do you still want to prove your point?" he asked playfully.

She locked her arms around his neck. "What point?"

"No idea." He gave her lips a peck in satisfaction. "We still have a few hours before the kids arrive. What do you say to us locking these respectful quarters and take this to that bed I never use?"

Mia just kissed him again in response. He _really_ was an arse…

* * *

Ginny Weasley generally didn't have a problem with her boyfriend's innate tendency to go looking for trouble. Harry wouldn't be Harry without his share of heroics, after all. Plus, there was also the fact that she owed her life to these 'heroics', seeing as they were what had led him to go rescue her from the Chamber of Secrets over three years before. She loved Harry for his courage as much as for his troubles or insecurities.

Yet, the fact that, after leaving that painfully long gathering Slughorn had them to attend for some reason, he'd decided to follow Zabini into the Slytherin compartment under his invisibility cloak to go eavesdrop Malfoy and likely gotten himself caught didn't exactly make her happy. What else would explain that the train had just reached Hogwarts and there was yet no sign of Harry ever since he'd gone on his mission over half an hour before?

"I'm gonna look for him," Ginny told Izzy, as they stood outside the train, waiting while Ron and Hermione were busy rounding up the first years to send to Hagrid. Nearby, a group of aurors, Tonks among them, was patrolling and making sure everyone got in the carriages. "If somebody asks where we are… well, tell them the truth."

"Do you think he's in trouble?" Izzy asked her, slightly worried. "_Again_?"

Ginny shrugged. "What else?" She reached for the tiny pigmy puff that her brothers had given her, who'd been resting on her shoulder. "Keep an eye on Arnold for me, would you?"

Izzy gave her a final nod before she made her way back to the train's entrance. She wasn't sure of which door would lead her to the right coach until she literally ran into Malfoy climbing out of one. He didn't seem all that pleased to see her there. "Watch where you're going, Weaslette," he snarled.

"Go piss in the wind for all I care," she unceremoniously said, pushing her way into the train without giving him another look.

_Which compartment?_ She thought as she stood in the vestibule. She could count six from there… Yet, the blinds were drawn down on only one of the compartments – someone had been trying to hide something there. She made her way along the hall and slid its door open. It looked empty.

"Harry?" she called, getting no answer. Ginny took a step further into the compartment and her foot hit something on the floor – something invisible. She raised an eyebrow and reached down, trying to grab it. Her hand touched something with a satin-like texture and she pulled it, revealing Harry to be petrified and with a broken nose hidden under his invisibility cloak.

Ginny sighed. "Why is it that you always end up covered in blood, Potter?" she asked, reaching for her wand._"Finite incantatem."_

Immediately, the stiffness he'd been feeling left Harry's body and he was finally able to move. "Oh, thank Merlin. I thought I was going all the way back to London…"

"You git. Izzy and I were worried sick. Ron and Hermione would be too if they weren't busy with the first years," she scolded him, helping him up

"Sorry," he apologized as his hand tentatively touched his swollen nose. "Ooch." He reached for a handkerchief and Ginny took it from him, helping him clean the blood on his face.

_"Ginny, are you there? Is Harry with you?"_ they heard Tonks's familiar voice asking from the vestibule.

"We're here," Ginny called back.

"_The train is about to leave, so unless you guys want to go back home_…"

"Come on," she said, pulling Harry out of the compartment by the arm. "We'll talk outside."

The engines were already running by the time they climbed out of the train and Tonks, who was waiting outside, raised her eyebrows at Harry's appearance. "Well, I never thought you had it in you to knock him around, Ginny. Trouble in paradise?" she asked, amused.

Ginny smirked. "Sure. I punched him on the nose when he grabbed a handful of my arse. No respect for a girl, these days."

"Ah, wait until I tell that one to Remus and your brothers," Tonks joked.

"Hey!" Harry spat back. "I respect Ginny just fine."

Tonks chuckled for a moment before making an effort to put on a serious face. She was on service, after all. "Who did it, really?"

"Draco Malfoy," Harry said bitterly, avoiding the details around the incident. "We don't really get along."

"Yeah, I can see that," the auror stated. "If you stay still I can fix your nose before Mia sees you and freaks out, thinking you were ambushed by Death Eaters." He gave her a nod and did as she said, feeling thankful later when he saw that his nose was back together.

Tonks walked then back to the threstral-drawn carriages and, on their way, Ginny kept shooting him inquisitive looks, which he dismissed, telling her in a whisper to wait until they were in the carriage. Just as they arrived, they could see the last group of students, who happened to include Ron, Hermione and Izzy, at a distance, having just left on one of the carriages. They waved at him, seemingly relieved to see him before their carriage slipped out of view in the middle of all the trees.

He and Ginny climbed on theirs and quickly bid farewells to Tonks before the threstral began to pull them. "Well?" Ginny asked, sitting by his side, half turned to him. "Did you find anything?"

He nodded. "I did. Malfoy talks way too much for his own good. He was talking about Voldemort… he bragged he was working for him, Ginny. He all but said it out clear."

"Maybe he was just talking out of his arse to impress Pansy… You know how he's always been cocky."

He shook his head. "No, it makes sense, now. The other day at Knockturn, he showed his left arm at Borgin. It didn't make much sense then, but now… The dark Mark is branded on the left forearm, isn't it?"

Ginny was taken aback by his question and her hand reached to his. "Are you saying…?"

He nodded. "I think Draco Malfoy has become a Death Eater."

**A/N: Kind of a filler, except for the last part. It wasn't a very inspired week... Good news is that I got top marks in the presentation I had last Wednesday, so at least the lack of inspiration was worth** **it. I apologize for the lateness again - real life is a bother sometimes... Feedback is very welcome. Review!**


	8. Normalcy

**14 September 1996 **

After coming up with his new theory concerning Malfoy being a Death Eater, Harry hadn't waited longer than until after the welcoming feast to communicate it to Sirius, who'd seemed rather upset about it, though he'd been open to believe every word.

While that reaction puzzled Harry at first, it hadn't taken Harry long to understand it: Sirius's younger brother, Regulus, had also been around that age when he'd joined the Death Eaters, according to what Mia had once told him. He understood then that, even if Malfoy was far from the top of his godfather's list of favourite people, it hit close enough to home to bring back some bitter feelings back… Yet, knowing enough of his godson's way and that they'd need better proof to even consider accusing Malfoy of being a Death Eater, Sirius had warned him to be careful if (or rather when) he kept on investigating it, which Harry had promised him to keep in mind as he'd already done with Ginny.

The first day of classes and the ones that followed seemed to go well enough, apart from Harry and Snape's constant quarrels, which, by the end of the second week of classes had already gotten him two nights of detention and another one to serve. Although, if DADA was a frustrating for many students, the newly created Defence Club, which gathered twice a week after classes, seemed to bring up the spirits of all its members, over half of them formerly affiliated to the DA.

Also, Slughorn's presence hadn't come unnoticed. As it had been his habit for decades, Slughorn liked to surround himself with brilliant (or simply well-known) minds, having gathered Harry during his train ride to Hogwarts as well as Ginny and Izzy. In the teacher's lounge, whenever he found Sirius or Mia around, he'd praise Harry's 'innate talent at potions', which puzzled them both, since their godson had barely made it into NEWT-level potions. When casually asked about it by Sirius, he'd shrugged and blamed it on luck, though Hermione had sullenly said that 'Harry's text book was so thorough that year that it practically did all the work', adding a glare to Harry by the end of it. That improvement in potions and his private classes with Dumbledore, seemed to be the two things Harry was most secretive about that year, though Sirius and Mia hoped he'd get around talking to them about it at some point.

On the second Friday of the school-year, Mia arrived at Grimmauld Place after classes by herself, as Sirius would be supervising the Gryffindor Quidditch tryouts later that day. After Kreacher had thoroughly inquired her about her lunch – he'd grown very insistent that she eat properly ever since she and Sirius had fought back in June and she'd all but completely lost her appetite, causing herself to faint as a consequence of that and an unknown pregnaacy –, he'd informed her that Lulu had gone to the house library after she'd put Alex down for a nap and, with a small 'thanks', Mia made her way to go meet her mother.

The Blacks' library was large, yet far from being half as much as Hogwarts's, consisting of a single magically enlarged ballroom sized-room on the ground floor. Its collection had suffered several changes over the most recent years, considering Mia and Lulu, and later Sirius, had gotten rid of a large number of dark-themed books when they'd moved into Grimmauld Place.

When she came, Lulu was standing by one of the bookcases flipping the pages of a dusty book. "Looking for reading material?" Mia asked.

She didn't bother looking up, knowing her daughter's voice by heart. "Sort of. Your father asked me to check if there was any book on widely spread protective wards here," Lulu mumbled before looking up. "He and Mad-Eye are doing this job for the Order, trying to find a way to cast village-wide protective spells on Muggle areas without the Muggles in question noticing them, which is probably the hardest part of it…"

Mia sighed. "Well, I doubt you'll find them here. The Blacks were complete Muggle-haters before Sirius came around, remember? If anything, they might have books on village-wide curses against Muggles."

"Mad little creeps," Lulu murmured under her breath, closing the book and putting it away. "Where's your husband, anyway? Shouldn't he be following you around, being an overprotective berk?"

She couldn't help letting out a laugh at her mother's words. "He's not that bad now – at least not since I threatened him with a pumpkin head. Anyway, Sirius stayed behind at the school to oversee the Gryffindor Quidditch team tryouts."

"Harry's captain this year, isn't he?"

Mia nodded, smiling as she sat down by a table set between the bookcases. "He's thrilled about it. Sirius didn't really need to stay for the tryouts but Harry asked him to – he was a bit nervous."

Lulu chuckled, sitting opposite her daughter. "You know, in fifth year I was running for Quidditch Captain. Actually, Gabe and I were, though I was for Hufflepuff and him for Gryffindor."

"Really?" Mia asked. "You were both in the Quidditch team?"

Her mother nodded and snorted at something. "Believe it or not, our relationship started out as a vicious rivalry between chasers of opposite teams – the first time he kissed me was in fourth year just to shut me up when I was yelling at him for having stolen the quaffle from right under my nose. I still say that was cheating."

"Which part? The stolen quaffle or the stolen kiss?"

She paused. "Both. Of course, it wasn't long before I kissed him back. You know, this makes me wonder how the daughter of two gifted Quidditch players could end up a hopeless flier like you did," the older woman said, shaking her head. "It's just embarrassing!"

"I don't think that sort of skill is inherited with genetics, Lu," Mia pointed out dryly as her hand rested on her own pregnant belly. Suddenly, she felt like she couldn't wait to meet her baby, to know what skills and features it had inherited from her and Sirius. _Three and a half more months_, she reminded herself.

Lulu sighed. "Well, it should. There's still time, you know? For you to learn how to stop embarrassing yourself on a broom. Sirius is a Quidditch coach, after all."

Mia chuckled. "No, thank you. I'd probably end up accidentally impaling my own husband with a broomstick while trying to get it on the air and I'd rather have him around to change nappies." As if there weren't enough risks of one getting killed with the war going on for her to add another one… "Anyway, did you ever end up becoming the Quidditch captain?"

"Nope," Lulu said, casually. "I ended up getting knocked up by the guy who did become the other team's captain, instead. Didn't turn out to be that bad of a bargain in the end, seeing as you wouldn't be around if I'd gotten the position," she added.

That brought a smile to Mia's lips. "I'm glad I had you around too, Lu," she said back.

"Where else would I be?" her mother asked.

"I don't know… didn't you have any dreams for the future?" Mia inquired, finally voicing something that she'd always wondered. "Like being a healer or travelling around the world feeding starving children?"

Lulu shook her head. "I had no idea what I wanted to be. Really. I knew what I didn't want, however: a nine to five job or living in a routine. It was after I'd given you up that I decided what I really wanted: to be there for you. So, I went after you and you know the rest of the story. I got all I wanted."

"Except for Gabe," Mia added.

"I have him now, don't I? We were too complicated back then, anyway, with the whole teenager thing – you were enough for me. You have kids, Mia, so you know what that's like, now."

That last sentence worked a switch being pulled. She didn't want to think of that, a world without Sirius. Not again. "I don't think I'd be able to live without Sirius," she whispered. "I don't think I'd bear it, Lu."

Lulu reached for her daughter's hand, watching the shadows hit her eyes. "Don't underestimate yourself, Mia. You've spent twelve years without him, remember? And you lived."

"I don't think I'd be able to live that way again – not forever. It was like half of me was empty," she told her, her eyes clouding with tears. "Every time he goes out to fight or Harry gets in trouble… If something happens to him or one of the kids…"

"Stop thinking of the 'what ifs', Mia," Lulu told her firmly. "Not only will you land yourself in the loony bin if you keep up with that but also your baby will be born depressed. What the point of thinking of what may go badly in the future? It goes the way it goes – there's nothing we can do to change it. If anything, think of the good stuff. Like that kid you're carrying. Think of patterns for the nursery walls or its curtains. That will keep you occupied."

As always, in her own way, Lulu's words did the job. Mia's hand moved to her abdomen and she brushed the tips of her fingers against it – the baby was moving, feeling her distress or maybe just throwing a tantrum. It was calming, as always. "I wish I was more like you. That I didn't worry so much."

Her mother raised her eyebrows. "You think I don't worry, Mia? Oh, I do, Mia. Believe me, sometimes I worry so much I can't sleep. I worried for seven whole months from the time you went into hiding to when McGonagall showed up at my doorstep asking me if I wanted to go stay with you. I worried so much when you got hurt back in June that I wanted to bang my head against a wall to make it go away. Worry comes with the package. The thing is I'm better at hiding it than you are. Maybe at dealing with it too."

"Really?" Mia asked, surprised. She'd always taken Lulu as the positive-thinker.

Lulu nodded. "Look, people die every day for a million of different reasons. Nobody stays here in the end. There's just no use ruining your happiness by thinking of it too often. Sirius is fine, your kids are fine. Be happy with that. Have that baby you're carrying and then go ahead and make a bunch more with him. Hopefully, you'll get your happy ever after. Now, can we be done with the depressive crap?"

She let out a deep breath. "Okay. Sorry, I was just…"

"… emotional. I know. Your moods swing like a jump-rope when there's a kid on board. Been there, done that," Lulu told her, craving for another subject – the environment in the room had just gotten too heavy for her own taste… "Back to more cheerful matters, since Sirius is busy at Hogwarts, what are you doing this afternoon here all by yourself? Don't tell me you're going stay locked at home correcting essays or something, that's just a waste of a good afternoon."

"Well, I do have a bunch of essays on the Muggle inquisition to correct," Mia pointed out.

"My own daughter, an annoyingly responsible goody two-shoes," Lulu said under her breath, shaking her head. "Unbelievable..."

"However," Mia continued, ignoring her statement, "I have other plans for today."

"And those plans would be…?" Lulu inquired, suspiciously.

Mia raised her eyebrows and gave her an annoyed look. "Oh, now you want to know? I thought with me being an 'annoying responsible goody-two-shoes', my activities were boring to you."

"Maybe there's still hope for you if you prove me wrong."

Mia rolled her eyes. "Since you're so interested, I'm planning to wait until Alex is up from his nap and then I'll take him with me to Hogwarts so we can surprise Sirius by watching the tryouts. Happy?"

"As a matter of fact, I am," Lulu pointed out. "Maybe if you took a little risk and considered leaving Alex with your daughter for a few minutes while you go looking for a broom cupboard for you and Sirius…"

"Don't you have work to get to or something?" Mia inquired to get her to shut up before that conversation reached more embarrassing themes.

"Nope. I've got the day off, since I went helping them last Sunday when I usually don't work," Lulu said, grinning. "I can't stay much longer, anyway. I've got a date tonight."

"A date?" her daughter asked, raising an eyebrow. "But you and Gabe live together."

"And that's exactly why we created a new one-date-every-week rule. To make sure we won't just fall into a routine. Each week one of us is in charge of the planning - last week it was me and we went bowling. We sucked at it, by the way, but it was pretty fun. Hopefully, tonight he'll take us to the Puddlemore United game – I've been sending him hints all week."

Mia smiled. "I see you guys are having a good time, then."

"We do what we can," Lulu said, shrugging like it wasn't that big of a deal as she got up. Truth was, she'd never been happier in her whole life. "Well, I should probably go – I've got stuff to do before the date, getting Gabe to spill his plans for tonight being one of them…"

"Wait, Lulu," Mia said, suddenly, "Can I just ask you one last thing?"

She shrugged. "You can ask me anything."

"Will you ever let Gabe make an honest woman out of you?"

"What? By marrying me?" Lulu inquired before taking a moment to think of it. She didn't think of herself as the marrying type but then again, she'd never thought she'd end up with Gabe again… "Sure, if he ever gets me drunk enough. I'd like to see him try, though – he drinks like a girl. Probably would pass out after the third shot of firewhiskey."

"I bet he'd make an effort for you, Lu."

"Auror or not, I'd kick his arse afterwards if he tricked me into marrying him. I'd hex his arse. He'd be bedridden for the whole honeymoon."

Mia smiled – she might give him a little grief but Mia knew she wouldn't even think of getting an annulment. It didn't really matter if they got married or not, as long as they were happy together.

* * *

"I don't remember so many people ever turning up for the tryouts," Sirius told his godson as they stood at the entrance of the Quidditch pitch.

"Don't say," Harry said through his teeth as he stared at the insane crowd of Gryffindors that was forming in the centre of the pitch, which only made him more nervous than he already was about being captain. He loved Quidditch, he really did. But what if he ended up sucking at the job? Maybe Katie Bell should have gotten the shield instead… He glanced once more at the mob. "Merlin, if I have to watch every single one of them trying out, I won't leave this pitch for the next two days. And I have detention with Snape today at half past nine!"

Sirius made an enormous effort not to snort at that – after all, it would sound just cruel to laugh at the kid in such a situation. "Hum, I can't help much with the tryouts, kid – as the referee for the games, I've got to be impartial to all Quidditch teams. Still, if you want my advice, before you actually have people climbing on their brooms, wave a golden snitch in front of them and see how many can even tell what it is. It's safe to say those who don't probably won't do any good for the team…"

Harry looked up at him, impressed. "That may actually work."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Of course it will work. I came up with it," he said in a mock-cocky tone. "Also, James used to have them all fly around the pitch once in small groups. That usually made a good filter too, so you might want to that as well. Those who crash or end up falling probably won't be promising success either."

He nodded nervously. "Ask them what a snitch is and have them fly around the pitch. Okay, I can do that," he said, trying to convince himself. Then, a horrible idea came to his mind. "What if they all fall and crash? Merlin, what if everyone sucks at Quidditch?"

Sirius snorted. "Kid, stop freaking out. Look at how many people are here to try out – it's statistically impossible for any of them not to be remotely decent at it."

"Sorry. It's just that this is important to me. I don't want to be a crappy captain…"

"You were the youngest seeker in a century, Harry. I reckon you'll be just fine as captain," his godfather assured him in amusement before suddenly being startled by the feeling of something, or rather someone, clutching itself around one of his legs. He looked down and was surprised to see his grinning youngest son was the responsible for that. "And how on Earth did you get here, mate?" he asked Alex as he picked him up, not actually expecting a coherent response.

Nevertheless, it came out clear enough. "Mama!" the little boy squealed, pointing towards Mia's approaching form.

Sirius grinned as he saw her walking in his direction. "Well, what a nice surprise," he told her.

She smiled back. "That little rebel escaped just as we were about to get in here and completely ruined my entrance." She turned to Harry. "I hope you don't mind having two more fans joining the club, Harry."

Harry smiled. "You and Alex are part of a restricted group of fans that I actually like to have around, Aunt Mia."

"I hope I'm in it too," Sirius pointed out. "Godfather and all. Devoted fan and possibly Quidditch mentor…"

"Not even slightly," Harry joked, feeling in a much better mood. "I had to pick between you and Ginny and she'd kind of prettier. I hope you'll understand…"

Sirius mock-glared at him. "I'll have you know that I deeply resent that."

Oh his father's arms, Alex laughed at the look on his face and turned to his surrogate brother. "Hawy queech!" he said, reaching to touch the Firebolt.

"I think that's supposed to mean Quidditch," Mia explained, smiling.

Harry chuckled and let him touch the broomstick, which Alex did eagerly. His hand, however, was still too small to completely close itself around the handle and the toddler let out an annoyed grunt. "Baaad," he complained, sadly, resting his head against his father's shoulder.

Harry reached to ruffle the little boy's hair. "One of these days you'll be big enough to play with it too," he said before looking at his godparents. "I should probably go or this will never be over."

"Good luck with the picks," Mia told him, to which he responded with a rushed 'thanks' before walking away and joining the other players on the centre of the pitch.

"Well, let's find ourselves a place to sit, shall we?" Sirius suggested. His free arm circled her back while the other held Alex firmly. As soon as he saw himself in the deserted stairway that led to the pitch's stands and out of everyone's view, he turned to her and, without a warning kissed her lips deeply. As always, she didn't resist and kissed him back, curling her lips against his.

"What was that for?" she asked him when they pulled away because of their little son's protests for attention.

"Just a small 'thanks' for the surprise. With so many people here, this is bound to take long and I was already thinking I'd get bored being here on my own all that time," he stated as they resumed going up the stairs.

After they found themselves sits right in the front row, Alex, faced with the unfamiliar surroundings looked incredibly curious, glancing every direction possible and naming everything he could.

Down at the pitch, the tryouts were starting and Harry seemed to be filtering the candidates in the ways Sirius had suggested. Soon, over half the crowd of students that had been trying to get in the team had moved from the field to the stands and others were still down there, protesting for having been refused.

It was with amusement that Sirius noticed one of them, a tall girl with long black hair, seemed to be trying to 'charm' Harry into accepting her not only in the team but also in more… personal ways – his godson, however, looked awfully embarrassed and took a large step back for every single one she took further. Suddenly, the girl jumped back and started to scratch herself furiously as if a million ants were crawling over her body. Sirius knew the effects of an Itching Jinx when he saw one and, judging by the fact that Ginny was just shoving her wand back into her pocket and glaring at the girl, he had no doubt she'd been the person responsible for it. Harry seemed to realize that too and shot his girlfriend a thankful look, who smirked in return.

"Who was that little vixen hitting on Harry?" Sirius asked his wife as Alex watched in amazement as the players flew around the field. He knew for a fact that the girl didn't belong to any of the classes he'd taught as he usually remembered all of their names and faces.

"That would be Romilda Vane," Mia said, dryly. "Vane as in Barbara Lasher's first husband… or was it second?"

"Babs's spawn? Don't say… seems as charming as her mother. Little question: why is she in Gryffindor?"

Mia shrugged. "Well, not all Gryffindors are saints, Sirius," she pointed out. "You know, I always thought there was a very thin line between the most arrogant Gryffindors and the tamest Slytherins. Take your cousin Andromeda for an example – she's far from cunning or conceited and was brave enough to stand up to her family and marry a Muggle-born. She probably walked on that line, though she ended up falling on the Slytherin side."

"And I fell on the Gryffindor side," Sirius added

Mia nodded. "Yes, but I don't think the line-theory applies to you. You may be a bit cocky from time to time and have had your bully moments but you're very far from the Slytherin house. No line-walking for you."

He grinned. "I'll take that as a compliment – I just can't picture myself as Snivellus' dorm-mate." Then, he nodded down at his giggling son. "Where do you think this one will end up?"

Mia caressed the little boy's soft hair and he looked up at her with a smile, calling her 'Mama'. "He's a very smart little boy – could certainly end up as a Ravenclaw."

"Hum, I don't see him as the bookish type," Sirius stated, doubtful. "

"That's a cliché. Not all Ravenclaws are bookish, Sirius. In fact, Hermione is bookish and she's a Gryffindor."

"Well, how about we ask him, then?" Sirius suggested, shifting their son so he was sitting sideways on his lap, half facing him and Mia. "What do you prefer, Alex? Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw of Slytherin?"

The little boy frowned at so many complicated words. "Want bawl!"

"Ball? That's not a house, mate," Sirius said with a laugh.

Mia rolled her eyes. "I think he means he'd rather watch the tryouts than answering silly questions like that one. How about we let the Sorting hat choose ten years from now?"

Sirius sighed. "I guess there's no other way of knowing…" he gave up, turning the little boy to face the game, for his own delight.

Meanwhile, to Harry's delight, Ginny had scored seventeen times in a row and, without a doubt impartially, gained herself a position as Chaser along with the already Quidditch-veteran Katie Bell and one of hers and Izzy's dorm-mates, Demelza Robins. Soon enough Ginny, now followed by Izzy and Luna, who'd been watching the tryouts from the opposite side of the Quidditch pitch until then, joined Sirius and Mia on the stands and unceremoniously stole Alex from them for their own entertainment.

At some point, as the sun was starting to set behind the clouds and the number of players trying out was reduced to a mere dozen, the Keepers' tryouts started and Ron was supposed to face a cocky seventh-year Gryffindor, Cormac McLaggen.

While the two competed, Mia sighed and leaned against Sirius's arm, closing her eyes. She couldn't tell why, she just felt like she needed to feel his comfortable warmth. Maybe it was the normalcy – they were sitting together, watching their godson's Quidditch tryouts and enjoying their time together. There was no sign of war whatsoever in the horizon. Just normalcy at that moment. She realized she wanted it, badly. It was her goal – all she wanted for the future was just that plain, normal happiness… and peace. His warmth completely covered her as his arm circled her and draw soft circled with the tips of its fingers against the side of her belly. The baby seemed to like it too, as it kicked back in approval.

"Are you cold?" Sirius asked her, his voice mixed with Alex's delighted squeal in the background as Izzy tickled him.

She opened one eye and shook her head. "I'm just thinking."

"Of what?"

"Happy stuff," she replied truthfully. "Did you feel the baby kick?"

He grinned and nodded. "I guess he or she likes me."

"More like loves you," Mia said. "If this is a girl, she'll have you wrapped around her little finger. If it's a boy… well, it will pretty much be the same."

"I'd be happy to let myself be wrapped," he pointed out with a grin. "If he or she comes out with your eyes, I'm a goner, love. You'd better watch out."

Mia laughed. "You silly idiot," she called him, lifting her head from his shoulder and looking at the pitch. Just as she did, McLaggen, who'd been defending the goal posts, completely missed one of the Quaffles thrown at him, launching himself in the direction opposite to it. There was an echo of laughter and boos. " don't know much about Quidditch but that wasn't good, was it?"

Sirius snorted and shook his head. "He'd either have to be blind or confunded to miss like that." He shook his head as, down at Quidditch field, Harry seemed to turn suspiciously to Hermione, who sat several yards away from Sirius and Mia at the stands and presented a very red face, which she promptly hid behind a book. Maybe McLaggen _had_ been confunded, Sirius thought. But then again, the guy had sounded like a conceited git when he'd introduced himself to Harry before the tryouts and told him he hadn't made it to them in the previous year because he'd eaten a pound of doxy eggs in a bet… Nobody wanted someone that smug and stupid in their Quidditch team. "Well, if Ron catches them all, he'll be in." He turned to Mia. "How bored are you now?"

"Just a little. I'd be worse if I'd stayed at home," she pointed out with a smile.

"Hum, and what do you say I make up to you by dumping Alex on his wonderful godmother, Elizabeth, for a few hours just as soon as we leave the school so I can take you for a little romantic dinner that may or may not get me luck afterwards?" he suggested with a charming grin.

Mia smiled – apparently Lulu wasn't the only getting a date that night. "Actually, I think that's a very good idea." And, not caring for the people around, she kissed him softly on the lips. Normalcy indeed.

**A/N: Back to the every-seven-days postings. I kind of missed Lulu dialogues - she's probably one of my favourite characters to write, so I used this chapter to make up for the lost time. Time to write was kind of limited as I have weekly projects for one of my classes (not my favourite). Anyway, I hope you liked to read it. Feedback is welcome - Review!**


	9. Destruction

**A/N: Little note before reading - this chapter acts as sort of an intruduction to something happening much later in the story (really much later). Kind of darker than usual, acording to my sister.  
**

******1****7 November 1996**

Over two and a half months into the new school year at Hogwarts, the Death Eater attacks kept increasing. If a few months before they'd happened once every two weeks, now not they could happen once or twice the same week… and not always the Order was able to arrive on time. Muggle villages, because of their larger vulnerability and the Death Eater's hatred for non-magical people, kept on being the most frequent targets, though witches and wizards disappeared all over the country.

Things at Hogwarts, however, went as smoothly as they could possibly go, even if Harry kept getting detentions with Snape every other week. The school was probably one of the most well-protected places in the Wizarding World due to all the wards around it and knowing Izzy and Harry were constantly there, as well as being able to see them every day, gave both Sirius and Mia a feeling of safety in what came to their kids. As for home, that feeling generally remained, being broken occasionally during the tense moments whenever Sirius was called to fight for the Order.

The seventeenth of November dawned as a miserable rainy day that completely reflected both Sirius and Mia's mood as they woke up. Having been called to protect a Muggle village near Glasgow around nine in the previous night, Sirius hadn't made it back home until two in the morning. That and Mia fighting back sleep at home until he arrived, just getting the few and short moments of snoozing that her seven-and-a-half-month pregnant body wouldn't resist, had cause them both to be sleepy and moody in the morning.

"Someone shut that stupid alarm clock up," Sirius mumbled, his voice muffled by the fact that his face was buried in his pillow as the clock loudly announced that it was seven in the morning.

"It's on your side of the bed – you shut it up," Mia responded dryly, stealing the pillow from under his head and using it to cover her ear and muffle the sound as she lay on her side.

"Hey!" he complained. "I've got to turn off the alarm clock _and_ you get to steal my pillow?"

She uncovered her face slightly to give him a glare. "Well, I'm sleeping for two, aren't I? I get to have two pillows, then. Now turn off that thing – it's annoying the baby."

He mumbled something about her weird moods under his breath as he forcefully reached for the alarm clock, trying to move as little as was possible. Not a good idea, he concluded. The wretched object ended up falling on the floor and blaring even louder than before. _Stupid magical alarm clocks,_ he thought. If it was a muggle one, it certainly would have broken to pieces on the fall and just shut up – that one only got louder to get back at him. He ended up having to summon it back with his wand in order to finally turn it off.

With the annoying sound gone, Mia gave him back the pillow as a peace offering and he tentatively tried to circle her largely expanded waist with one of his arms, hoping to get a little cuddle out of it – a seven and a half month pregnant belly was certainly no small bump. He took her lack of complaining about his gesture as a sign that her mood had gotten slightly milder in the absence of a blaring alarm clock and decided that maybe they should just start that morning over. Gently, his lips reached for hers in a quick kiss. "Good morning," he whispered just as he felt a very soft kick coming from inside Mia's belly hitting his arm. He raised his eyebrows. "Hum, you weren't kidding – the little one really is annoyed."

She couldn't keep a straight face and ended up chuckling at his words. "It's probably just stretching out a little – I bet it's getting kind of cramped in there," Mia said as his knuckles started to brush on her abdomen soothingly.

"Hum… I don't know. This sounds more like a tantrum to me," Sirius pointed out, smiling. "I'm starting to think this baby is a girl. You women with your tempers…"

She slapped him on the arm. "We do not have a temper – not unless we are provoked. Besides, I believe the one in this couple who acted out the most in his childhood was you, Mr. Black, not me. It could just as easily be another boy if we follow that line of thought."

"Fifty-fifty chance, isn't it?" he stated, though his money was still on the baby being a girl. "I guess we'll find out soon enough – just one more month and half, hum?"

"It's getting pretty close," she said, feeling herself in a much better mood than she had before – she couldn't wait to be able to hold her baby. "Have you come up with any first names already?"

"Yeah, a couple of them. I need to look the little one in the face to be sure, though. Wouldn't want it to hold a bad name against me like Tonks holds hers against Andromeda," he said with a chuckle.

"I think the baby would have a slight problem with expressing its opinion on the name yet," she informed him with a sceptical look on her face. "Lack of ability to speak and all…"

He shrugged. "Well, if it doesn't cry bloody murder at the name, I can always say there were no protests from his or her part." Sirius gave her belly one last pat when the baby stopped moving, likely having gone back to sleep. He sighed. "Am I the only one who feels like staying here in bed until dinner time at least?"

"Nope. Five hours of sleep either on a pregnant body or after coming back from a battle don't quite seem enough, do they?"

"You could have gone to bed while I was out," he pointed out, giving her a slightly accusatory look.

She shook her head. "I wouldn't have been able to sleep decently without knowing you were okay. Don't tell me it wouldn't be the same if the roles were reversed."

"I know but…" Her eyes shot daggers at him and he sighed, defeated. "Well, I guess I should be glad you don't follow me into the battles at least."

She would in the future, Mia thought. She wouldn't risk the baby now but later, if she was needed, she'd go. She kept quiet about it as both of them knew it already – no need for a reminder that might make a fight emerge. "You still haven't told me how last night was," she said, shifting so she was sitting up on the bed.

He shrugged as he sat up as well, resting his back against the headboard. "It was a mess, as always, but at least nobody died this time – a few injured Muggles, nothing major. It was almost like the Death Eaters were playing a game with us last night, you know? Apparating from one place to another like it was hide and seek. Only a few were actually causing real havoc, the others were just… goofing around."

"I wonder if that's their idea of a night out with their mates," Mia said, sickened. "Nothing but good fun."

He nodded. "Who knows? They're all a bunch of sick bastards. Probably just wanted to show they could do whatever the hell they wished. We caught one, though – Flint Junior."

"Marcus Flint?" Mia asked in surprise. "Flint was a student of mine – he used to be the Quidditch Captain for Slytherin, I think, and had to repeat his last year at school because he failed every single one of his NEWTs."

Sirius scoffed. "Well, his intelligence didn't improve much ever since – Tonks managed to stun him with practically no fuss five minutes into the battle because he'd stopped to go take a leak in some alley." He rolled his eyes. "That brainless moron had better gather the few active brain cells he has to cooperate or he's looking at life in Azkaban – not that I think the other Death Eaters would give an airhead like him plenty of important information."

"Any information can help now, though," Mia pointed out. "Since the order barely has anything palpable."

Sirius nodded, huffing. "Yeah, I guess that's true. Anyway, I don't feel like talking about the Order, Death Eaters and battles – I'd rather not sour my day before breakfast-time," he said, leaning closer to Mia's cheek in order to kiss it. "Well, guess it's time I took a shower. Care to join me?"

She gave him a sceptical look. "I don't think so – somehow shower shagging and seven-month pregnant me don't seem to be a great blend. We'd probably end up killing ourselves at some point."

"Who said anything about shagging?" he asked, faking innocence.

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, like I don't know you and your plots long enough, Sirius Orion Black."

"Well," he reached to kiss her lips before getting up, "maybe afterwards, then."

Mia chuckled. "Maybe."

* * *

By lunch time, while Sirius and Mia's moods had increased immensely for a long list of reasons, including their early morning activities, the weather was still as miserable as before, if not even worse in the whole territory that included and surrounded Hogwarts.

After her last class of the day, Mia sat in her own office hearing the pouring rain outside while she finished grading a stack of essays from the third years, hoping she wouldn't need to take any work home that day. The words seemed to all blend together and her eyes were simply struggling to remain open. The lack of enough sleep was starting to catch up with her now – it wasn't that she found the essays particularly boring. Maybe she could just take a minute or two to rest them a little. Sirius would be busy for at least the next half hour, since he had a flying class with a bunch or eager first years that had refused to have their lesson cancelled because of the rain.

She put her quill down and soon her eyes were dropping closed. Leaning against the wooden back of her chair wasn't very comfortable but at least she knew she wouldn't be able to actually fall asleep there. Just rest her eyes for a few moments and then get back to grading essays…

Before her plan was able to backfire with her actually falling asleep, a small knock made Mia's eyes snap back open and turn her attention to the office's door. "Yes?" she asked.

A second year boy shyly made his way in. She practically knew all her students by their names and faces – she liked to know them – and it was easy to identify him. "Yes, Mr. Wick?"

"P… Professor McGonagall asked me to summon you to the headmaster's office. She asked form you to drop by as soon as you had time, Madam," the young boy said, slightly nervously. "It is important," he added.

The word 'important' immediately had her feeling uneasy, fearful even. One could never guess when bad news were coming during war time… Despite that, Mia found the strength to give the boy a calming smile while gripping the arms of her chair. "Thank you. I'm going right away. You can go back to your friends, Mr. Wick." And, as soon as the boy was out, she inhaled deeply.

She was nearly sure it was bad news. Who could it be? Lulu? Gabe? She closed her eyes. Alex? No, not her little boy. He was safe at home, wasn't he? Grimmauld Place was safe and Lulu was with him. _Get yourself together, woman,_ Mia ordered herself. She was freaking out. Nobody had said it was bad news – she couldn't just jump into that conclusion.

Steadier, she got up from the chair and took another breath before making her way to Dumbledore's office. Granted, after walking as fast as her large pregnant frame allowed her to, soon she was standing in front of the gargoyle protecting the secret passage that led up to the office. That was when she recalled nobody had given her the password. _Dang! _Knowing the headmaster's habits of using names of popular magical and Muggle sweets as a password, she started throwing their names to the air, hoping one would work. Cauldron Cakes seemed to do the trick as the gargoyle moved away and allowed her to step in.

As she reached the badly lit antechamber of the office, she found it empty and the door that led to the headmaster's office closed. Even if she really wanted to just burst in and get done with it, she had the good sense to knock first. Not more than ten seconds passed before the door clicked in front of her and a sober-looking McGonagall came out to meet her. Before the deputy headmistress could close the door, Mia heard sobbing coming from inside, followed by an agonized voice of a woman wallowing for _'her Margo, her baby'_.

No, that wasn't anyone she knew, was it? Maybe she wasn't the one receiving the bad news that time around. Yet, that thought didn't make her feel much better. She'd heard that sort of grief before, back when she worked as a healer. They couldn't always save everyone and bad news had to be given, so her gut told her that the sob she'd just heard from inside the office was the one of a mother crying for the loss of a child. The simple thought made her clutch her own stomach.

"What happened?" Mia asked McGonagall.

"I'm afraid there's too little time for me to explain it fully to you, Mia," the deputy headmistress said, her face very pale. "There was another attack less than an hour ago but it had nothing to do with your family. That I can assure you. It happened in an Irish village."

An attack in broad daylight and less than a day before the previous one? she thought, alarmed. It was getting worse. She barely knew what to say. "Do… do you need help or anything? I can aid with the healing…"

McGonagall shook her head. "It's not that. In any case, your friend Elizabeth is already in the Hospital Wing with Poppy. What we need, actually, is your parents' house."

Mia was confused. "My parents' house? You mean the Davis house in Wales?"

The older teacher nodded. "Because of the attack, the whole village was reduced to shambles, Mia. The people in Albus's office, Joanne and Thomas O'Dell, are old friends of ours – they've just lost their only daughter and son-in-law in the attack and now have two underage grandchildren, one is a student here in this school, to take care of with their home completely destroyed. If you let them use the house for the time being, you'd be doing us a great favour."

She nodded immediately. Mia knew what it was like to lose some of the people she loved the most and suddenly see herself with two kids to raise. The same had happened to her years before and, if she recalled it well, McGonagall had been an enormous help by bringing Lulu to her – somehow, she had a feeling Dumbledore hadn't been the one to come up with that idea. She owed her that much and her heart wouldn't allow her to give any other answer. "Of course – they can use the house as long as they need. Just floo Kreacher, have him taking you there. I haven't been to the house in a long time, though, so I can't really tell if it's habitable right now…"

"Don't worry about that. I'll ask Albus to send in a few house-elves to clean it up," McGonagall said, hurriedly. "I'm so sorry, Mia, I feel like you had a right to know more about the attack since you're being such a good help but…" she glanced at the office's door.

"You need to be there for your friends," Mia finished, feeling sympathetic for that couple that had just lost their daughter – she wished with every fibber of her body never to know what it felt like being in their shoes. "I understand."

McGonagall nodded. "Thank you, Mia. On their behalf and ours. Hopefully this will make things just a little easier for them."

But it wouldn't matter much to their suffering, Mia thought. She couldn't just picture how deep it would go and wouldn't dare herself to try imagining it. It felt so wrong parents having to bury their own children… She excused herself to leave moments later, unable to hear the sobbing coming from inside the headmaster's office, which seemed to be increasing its volume, and made her way back down the stairs, exiting through the gargoyle-protected doorway, only to crash with someone that was getting ready to go up.

"Oh, sorry, Professor. Didn't see you there," Seamus Finnigan said, giving her a nervous apologetic look.

She shook her head dismissively. "No harm done." It occurred to her that it probably wasn't the best time for a student to pop into Dumbledore's now. "Can I ask you why you're heading to the headmaster's office, Mr. Finnigan?"

Seamus shrugged. "Dunno, ma'am. McGonagall had Peterson, the head boy, calling me there urgently. I reckon I may be getting detention for some reason…"

Mia didn't even listen to his last sentence as her mind started putting the pieces together: the attack had occurred in Ireland and Seamus Finnigan was Irish… There was no way McGonagall was calling him for a trivial scolding when there was a couple grieving upstairs. He had to be the boy whose parents had been killed.

"… didn't happen to mention to you what I did, did she?" Seamus continued, oblivious to her spacing out. "Professor Davis?"

She snapped out of it and looked at him suddenly. "I… I think you should probably go talk to Professor McGonagall right now, Seamus," she told him, letting his first name slip. She couldn't just bring herself to bother with formalities while talking to a boy who was about to get his world turned upside down.

He seemed to sense something was wrong as his face shifted. Maybe it was something on her face or the way she'd said it – fact was that, as soon as she'd moved out of the way, Seamus sped up the secret passage without another word or looking back. Mia just stood there, unmoving and finally taking in the meaning of her realization.

She remembered seeing the Finnigans at Platform 9 ¾ just a few months before in the first of September – they'd seemed like a happy family, having their little farewell moment before one of their children was to board the train to Hogwarts. She'd felt… proud for them, for seeing someone else fighting for normalcy as she and Sirius were. And now they were dead, just like that. And the little girl, she thought. The father had been holding a little girl, Seamus's baby sister. She was alive, Mia knew that much – McGonagall had mentioned the grandparents had two grandchildren to watch now, which would make both Seamus and his sister alive. But had she gotten hurt? The mother in her just couldn't bear the idea of a child getting hurt in that greedy, pointless war. As if it wasn't bad enough the little girl whose name she didn't even know was parentless now, at such a tender age. Even if Mia had never really met the Finnigans, she was deep down was grieving for them, for the broken family that could have so easily been her own…

When she started walking, Mia headed towards the Hospital Wing. Elizabeth was helping there, she recalled. It wouldn't be the first time they used that space it to take care of some of the wounded from the largest Death Eater attacks. And if they needed any more help up there taking care of them, she wouldn't just stay back and walk away. Her back protested against her rush all the way to the infirmary but she didn't rest – she might not fight but at least she'd help. One way or the other, she'd help.

When she reached the large doors of the Hospital Wing, she immediately heard a child's cry coming from the inside just as a loud thunder sounded outside – she hadn't even noticed the thunderstorm beginning. Her head had clearly been too full of thoughts. When she got in, her eyes landed on her best friend carrying the wailing toddler, who was unmistakably Seamus Finnigan's younger sister, and pacing along the aisle that was formed between the rows of curtain-covered beds. Her eyes met with Elizabeth's when the little girl shouted for her 'Ma' and 'Pa' and both of them knew that they wouldn't come.

"How is she?" Mia asked, approaching the blonde healer while Madam Pomfrey sniffed against a paper tissue as she sat by her desk in a corner, crying – Mia guessed she'd lost someone in the attack as well.

"Terrified, confused… She's not harmed physically, though," Elizabeth said, rocking the little girl as she sobbed and called for her parents. "Her name is Darcy. Darcy Finnigan. Her parents were…"

"Killed. I know," Mia whispered. She tentatively reached to rub the toddler's back soothingly for a moment, though it didn't seem to have any effect in her. She just looked so small and helpless… "Have her grandparents been here to see her?"

She nodded. "Yes, they stayed with her for a few minutes. Long enough to calm her down and put her down to sleep. But then the thunders started and she just woke up and freaked out. It was thundering during the attack, I think. It must remind her of it."

"You sure she didn't get hurt at all? Sometimes people just don't show signs until later. Maybe she's crying because she's in pain too."

Elizabeth shook her head as little Darcy's cries subsided slightly at the same time the thunderstorm was showing signs of disappearing. "Kingsley Shacklebolt and I were the ones who found her – I couldn't help yesterday night with the attack because I had an emergency at the hospital, so I went on this one instead. Darcy was as safe as anyone could be in the middle of that mess. I examined her from top to bottom there, used every diagnosis charm I remembered. I barely found any bruise on her. She's just traumatized, I guess. Hopefully, she'll get better."

Mia seemed to be more satisfied with that answer and gave her friend a nod. "What about the other wounded? Do you need help with them? I can do that."

"Mia…"

"I know I don't practice anymore but that doesn't mean I don't still remember how to do the healing charms," she insisted.

Elizabeth shook her head. "It's not that, Mia. There are no wounded." There was a silent pause during which Mia tried to make sense of the meaning of her words. "She was the only survivor of the attack."

Mia wanted to say something but her mouth couldn't bring itself to move. No other survivors, she thought. None. They'd just wiped out the whole town? What for? Fun? How was that possible? "But… her grandparents…"

"They were spending a few days with an ill cousin here in Britain when this happened. It was small village, mostly Muggles, though there were a few Wizards and Squibs too. Of the forty-two people in the village during the attack, only Darcy lived. When the Order got a wind of it, it was too late – the Death Eaters were already gone when we arrived and everyone was… dead. We thought nobody had lived until we heard the crying coming from the middle of a house's shambles and found her in the basement, hidden inside a wardrobe. It had to be her mother hiding her there – her father was a Muggle, so he couldn't have cast all the protective charms that were around the basement. Only Dumbledore was able to break them all. She protected her daughter with all she had."

Mia covered her mouth in disbelief, feeling a chill shooting through her body. The simple thought of it, the destruction, the death, the mother doing all she could to save her child's life as Lily had… "Dear Merlin," she whispered.

"She was one year behind us at school. Her mother, I mean," Elizabeth mumbled. "I recognized her. Her name was Margaret O'Dell back then – she became head girl the year after we graduated. People usually called her Margo."

Hearing her mother's name seemed to have calmed the last of Darcy's cries, maybe by giving her a false hope that Margo was coming, and they were reduced to soft sniffing. Elizabeth made her way to a bed to put the little girl down again, hoping she'd fall asleep. Darcy's dark blonde hair was all tangled in knots instead of pristinely brushed as it had been back in king's Cross and her eyes, a blue-green shade that reminded Mia of the ocean, were rimed with red from the tears. _Poor baby_, she thought, brushing the child's hair. She really was no older than her Alex.

She sat there with Elizabeth for several more minutes while young Darcy Finnigan finally fell asleep in the bed. By the time her grandparents, a grief-stricken couple in their mid-sixties, arrived with a numb Seamus, Mia decided it was time to leave quietly and give them some privacy. She felt like she'd be intruding if she stayed.

Sirius was waiting in her office when she arrived, standing up from her sofa as soon as she stepped in. She didn't say a word at first and just walked closer to him, wrapping her arms around his form – with difficulty due to her large belly – and held on to him, surprising herself by not crying like part of her had been craving to do for the past hour. Suddenly, she realised that those bastards – Voldemort and his Death Eaters – didn't deserve her fear or her tears. All she wanted was for them to pay for everything they'd done: threatening her godson's life over and over, killing harmless Muggles and Wizards that were brave enough to stand up to them, destroying happy families like the Finnigans…

"Are you okay?" Sirius asked in a worried whisper after holding her for nearly a full minute.

Was she? That was a good question. Physically, she felt fine. Still a little tired, though, and her back did hurt a little. As for her mind, she really wasn't sure. "I don't know," she confessed, pulling away slightly. "I'm angry, though. I'm just so angry."

"This is about the attack to that Irish village, isn't it?" he asked her quietly. "I've just ran into Dumbledore – he was leaving for Flint's trial and told me a about it." Holding her hand, Sirius had them both sitting down on the sofa. "Those sons of a bitch had to be planning it all along. They'd never attacked twice in the same day – they were just baiting us last night so we'd have the guard down today. That's why they were acting so stupid. It was part of the bigger plan."

Her hand gripped one of the sofa's cushions. That realization only made her angrier than she already was… "Sirius."

He turned to her immediately. "Yeah?"

"Tell me we'll win this war," she requested, looking down. "I don't care if we don't know that for sure. Just… tell me what I need to hear. It will be enough for now."

"We'll win this war," he said as his hand reached to lift her chin up. "And I'm not telling you this because that's what you want to hear, I'm telling you because we _will_ win this war, Mia. I don't need to lie to you about that. I trust Harry to win this thing. Don't you?"

"You know I do – it just feels so unbelievable sometimes…"

He shook his head. "Many years from now, when we're old and grey, our kids have kids and Lulu is still around and kicking – because we all know that one is going to out-live every one of us with that wit of hers, we'll look back and think of how we enjoyed making those bastards pay for every miserable moment they made us go through."

She sighed. "You really think that, don't you?"

"Of course I do," he said, trying to give her a smile. "A storm is always followed by the good weather, isn't it?"

**A/N2: Sorry for posting this late. Field trips, studying, annoying teachers... take your pick. I really hate this semester at college. Anyway, I know there was lots of narrative this chapter but it really was about the feelings more tha the dialogues this time. Now, I'm going to bed because I'm deadbeat. Feedback is so very welcome. Review!**


	10. Celebration

**20 December 1996**

The cold winds of December announced the upcoming school break and the arrival of Christmas time. All over, Hogwarts had been heavily decorated accordingly to the season, even more so than in the previous years, under the orders of Dumbledore himself. Hopefully, the headmaster had thought, the Christmas spirit would smother temporarily that dark cloud of war hanging over everyone's heads, especially after Katie Bell had ended up badly cursed by a necklace during a November Hogsmeade visit. The enhanced Christmas spirit did seem to work mainly with the youngest students, though some of the older seemed pretty affected as well.

Fact was, the number of Death Eater attacks had decreased after Flint's arrest and trial as he'd spilled his guts and given away nearly two dozens of Death Eater's names in exchange for being exiled to a secured location instead of sent straight to Azkaban. After that little betrayal, several of Lord Voldemort's servants had gotten too busy (either by being sent to jail or being on the run from it) to bother with taking part in attacks.

Along with the extra Christmas decorations, the holidays had brought Slughorn's Christmas party. In the Gryffindor common room, Ginny Weasley sat in one of the armchairs waiting for Harry to finish getting ready for the party. It crossed her mind that usually it was the other way around – the guy waiting for the girl to get ready. But then again, usually the guy didn't come out of detention just fifteen minutes before the party in question and sped all the way to his dorm in order to change into his dress robes.

A hysterical burst of giggling coming from the portrait hole's direction had her turning her face to it. She wished she hadn't. Pressed against the wall was Lavender Brown, who happened to be busy getting snogged by Ron. It looked more like a face-sucking match than anything else, Ginny considered, feeling all the appetite she might have had earlier going down the drain.

It had been her fault… sort of. She'd been the one who'd dragged Harry to some secret passage a couple of weeks before in order to give him a victory snog after their first Quidditch game together and gotten herself caught by her brother. She'd also been the one who'd gotten really pissed off when he'd started blabbing about 'revoking his permission' for them to date if they kept on snogging in front of him, venting her fury by mocking him for never having snogged a girl and throwing to his face that even Hermione had done it with Krum. He seemed to have fixed that last part fast enough with Lavender's aid, which had caused an enormous rift between him and Hermione, who'd not only been supposed to have him as her date to Slughorn's party but also, though she wouldn't admit it, had been pining over him for a while.

And now, in the middle of it, Harry had the hard task of having to split himself between his two best friends, his girlfriend, his family, Dumbledore's lessons and his detentions. It made Ginny wonder if she should have just told Ron to piss off instead of provoking him – not that the git wasn't asking for it but she did feel bad for Harry and Hermione.

"Hey, you ready?" she heard Izzy as she came down from their dorm.

"Yeah, just waiting for Harry," Ginny replied without turning as her best friend sat on one of the sofas.

"Hum, I see Ron's having a good time," Izzy pointed out dryly, her tone rather sickened as she spotted the snogging couple at the entrance of the Common room. She was okay with a little kiss or maybe some light snogging in public but _that_ seemed to belong right inside a broom cupboard.

"It's like they're trying to suck each other's faces off," Ginny whispered furiously, turning to her friend. "It makes one wonder if Ron's feeding himself right since he's trying to make a meal out of Lavander."

"I can't believe you've just said that."

"Well, it's true, isn't it? Don't tell me it's _not_!"

Izzy rolled her eyes. "It does seem like they need to improve their technique," she offered diplomatically. "But it looks worse than it is to you because he's your _brother_. It's disgusting seeing him snog by principle. Kind of like me with you and Harry…"

Ginny didn't want to look but her eyes wouldn't obey and turned to face Ron and Lavender. Where was a prefect when she needed one to break it off? Oh, that's right, he was standing right in front of her giving them all a _show _– so, maybe Izzy was right. Ron being her brother only made it worse.

But she certainly wasn't the only one bothered by it. A group of first years were doing gagging sounds at the couple and Seamus Finnigan, who'd been unusually quiet ever since he'd returned to the school after spending three weeks at home mourning the loss of his parents, appeared to be a bit green while looking at the couple as he sat with Dean Thomas. Then again, Ginny thought, she'd always suspected he had some crush on Lavender Brown.

"Hey, Ginny, Izzy, have you seen Cormac anywhere?" she suddenly heard Hermione asking as she walked down the girls' staircase. Her words were enough to make Ron jump away from Lavender and look straight at her in confusion. "You know, that guy who _nearly_ made Keeper for Gryffindor," she added in a spiteful tone.

Ginny nearly clapped at the intervention but found it more satisfying to watch her brother's face change from confusion to infuriation, though he didn't breathe a single word.

"McLaggen?" Izzy asked, pretending to be surprised, as Hermione had already informed them of her plans. "No, not lately."

Hermione slapped her own forehead, in a fake self-scolding fashion. "Oh never mind. I completely forgot we'd agreed to meet downstairs so _he could escort me to Slughorn's party_. Thanks anyway." And, with that said, she made her way to the portrait hole, passing right in front Ron without a single acknowledgement.

"Brilliant," Ginny mumbled under her breath as a pouty Lavender left to go sit with Parvati and Ron made his way to the boy's staircase, looking annoyed to the bone. Hermione couldn't have picked a better date to get back at him than the pompous Cormac McLaggen. Letting out a satisfied breath, she turned to her best friend, feeling in a chatty mood. "So, where's Colin? You're still going with him, right?"

Izzy nodded. "Yeah but just as friends." Colin had wanted to go to the party but didn't get an invitation and she'd wanted a date so she wouldn't look pitiful. Since he was a friend and far from a prick, the deal had seemed good at the time. "He said he'd wait for me by Slughorn's office. He was hoping to snap a bunch of pictures of famous people."

"You sure that's nothing more than that? Just friends?" Ginny asked her best friend, curious. Ever since she and Harry had gotten together, Izzy appeared to have gotten pickier in what came to guys. If in the previous year she'd settled with Terry Boot easily even though what they had was a far from love, that year she'd already gone out with Dean Thomas once, another with Jimmy Peakes and finally with some Hufflepuff whose name Ginny couldn't remember, all those times saying something about 'no chemistry'.

"Just friends," Izzy assured her, referring Colin.

"Maybe you're being too picky with guys," Ginny suggested.

"I'm not." She paused, noticing the redhead's doubtful look. "Okay, maybe I am. I'm just… looking for something."

"And that something would be…"

She shrugged. "I dunno… a guy who can make me laugh without trying too hard. Just by being himself, you know?"

"Well, too bad there isn't a comedy club here at Hogwarts," Ginny joked.

Izzy shook her head. "It's not just that. I want someone who I can lean on and really talk to. Like my parents do."

"And you expect to find that guy among all the randy minds here at Hogwarts? The odds are against you, Isabelle."

"Well, you did," she pointed out.

Ginny didn't have any weapons against that point and couldn't help grinning because of it. "I'm lucky."

"Maybe I'm be lucky too. And since the product of your luck has just walked in, this conversation will have to be finished later," Izzy informed her as her Harry hurried towards them.

"I'm ready, let's go," he told Ginny.

She stood up from her seat and turned to him, smiling. "Your tie is all crooked," she informed him with a chuckle. And his hair was completely messy but that was impossible to fix and, honestly, she had a thing for that look.

He huffed, trying to fix the tie. "I hate dress robes."

She slapped his hand away from it and straightened it herself. "There you go. You look just like a big boy," she said in a tone that one would use with a five-year-old, poking his nose when she was finished.

He frowned. "Hey! I'm not a kid."

She chuckled and kissed his cheek right before he turned to glance at Izzy.

"Where's your date?"

"Colin's waiting for me outside Slughorn's office. I thought I'd walk with you guys, unless you're planning on making any detours…"

He ignored the last part. "Colin as in Creevy?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Do you have a problem with that?" She didn't even bother mentioning they'd be going as friends, all ready for a shouting match with the git for meddling with her dating life.

"Not unless he chases me around with his camera," he stated, making her face soften.

"Colin promised he'd behave," she assured him.

Harry gave her a doubtful look but just shrugged and urged them to get going. The long corridors of the castle were rather cold and empty, seeing as many students were probably already in the Great Hall, getting ready for Dinner. As soon as they reached the fifth floor and started to approach Slughorn's office, the music coming from it started to fill their ears, getting louder along with the voices for every step they took. A group of important-looking individuals walked by them and showed their invitations to Filch, who was serving as a porter that night. Colin Creevy also stood by the entrance, though he was distracted snapping a picture of a couple of seventh-years.

"Remind me again why we have to go to this thing…" Harry asked under his breath, staring at the lights coming through the open door.

Izzy was the one to answer. "Because you're the chosen one, my father was the first person to ever escape Azkaban and Ginny has wicked bat-boogey hex, which she happened to be aiming at Zacharias Smith's face when Slughorn was walking by."

"Damn," Harry cursed under his breath. He really had no way to escape the party without looking completely rude. _Just a couple of hours, three at the most, _he thought. Then, he'd claim to be exhausted, escape with Ginny, hopefully get a great goodnight kiss and go to bed. When he woke up in the morning, it would be time to catch the Hogwarts Express and go home for Christmas. He turned to Izzy. "Do you think you can convince Colin to go distract Slughorn by having him pose for a bunch of pictures? Maybe that way he'd forget about me for a while."

She raised an eyebrow. "And what would I get in return?"

"My eternal gratitude?"

Izzy wasn't convinced. "We'll have to renegotiate that later. Wait out here a minute while I take care of it. Hey, Colin!" she called the mousy brown-haired boy before reaching him and taking him into Slughorn's office.

"You know, you can always fake some sort of injury," Ginny suggested. "Fred and George once taught me this spell that gives the illusion of an exposed fracture. You should have seen Mom's face when Fred used it on George's neck and she saw him with his spine hanging out… She screamed bloody murder before realizing it was all bollocks."

Harry made a face. "Merlin, that's… that's completely morbid, not to mention disgusting. I'll have to pass. Besides, it can't be that hard to live through the party, right? If we go back to the common room, odds are we'll run into Ron and Lavender going at it."

"Again," she added just as Izzy showed up by the door, signalling it was safe for them to go in. "Ready?"

He shrugged. "Guess I am." He offered Ginny his arm to hold as they made their way into the party and she smiled as she cordially accepted it. Harry took a moment to observe the room, realizing easily it had been magically charmed to seem larger than it was, which, with the drapes all over, made it look like an enormous tent.

He spotted Hermione at the opposite side of the room, sipping from a glass and apparently not paying any attention to what McLaggen was saying by her side, simply giving a nod every now and then. Izzy had settled herself nearby, chatting with Luna Lovegood, who Ginny informed him that Neville had brought as a friend. Slughorn was proudly getting his picture taken as he stood laughing with a familiar-looking sturdy, dark-skinned woman.

"Holy Merlin. Harry, look, that's Gwenog Jones!" Ginny whispered frantically, staring at the woman.

_Hum, so that's why she looked familiar, _he thought. The very well-known Beater and captain of the Holyhead Harpies, Ginny's favourite Quidditch team of all times, usually had her picture in the sports section of the Daily Prophet every week.

If he hadn't known that being professional Quidditch Player and playing for the Harpies was Ginny's dream job, he might have laughed at that amazed, admiring look on her face as she looked at Jones – it kind of reminded him of the look Alex wore whenever he was impressed. He reckoned someday Ginny would be the one receiving the praises from every Quidditch publication in the country – she was a brilliant chaser already. Suddenly, an idea came to his mind – he realized it might turn out to be a pain in the arse for him but it would be worth it if it made his girlfriend's night. It was Christmas time, after all – one ought to be generous. "Hey, Gin, would you like to meet her? Gwenog Jones, I mean."

His girlfriend's face turned to him in a flash, disbelieving. "Are you kidding? Of course I would! She's my Quidditch hero!"

He smiled at her, then. "Let's go, then. I bet Slughorn is just looking forward to introduce Harry Potter to every single one of his protégés, Gwenog included. Guess if you stick with me, he won't mind introducing you too."

Before he could take a step Ginny pulled his arm so he'd look straight at her. "Wait. You're going to pull the Harry Potter card? But you've just gotten Izzy to get Slughorn off your back!" She knew how much he hated his fame and all the attention that it brought. Her mind just couldn't help thinking of how he was going to bring all of it onto himself just so she had a chance to meet her idol… just because of how much it meant to her.

In response to her question, Harry shrugged like it wasn't that big of a deal. "I guess if I have to use the fame every once in a while, it might as well be for you. See it as a Christmas gi…"

She was kissing him, very publically, before he could finish. Someone in the room – Ginny assumed it was Romilda Vane since she'd managed to infiltrate herself into the party as Zabini's plus-one – reacted to the kiss with a piercing shriek, which the couple ignored. Then, pulling away, she clutched his arm. "I love you, you know?" she kissed him again. "Now take me to Gwenog Jones!"

It occurred to him, as he made his way to Slughorn, that it was the first time one of them said it out loud – I love you – though it had been implied in their actions for months. "Love you too," he said very softly and, if it wasn't for Ginny looking up, giving him a brilliant smile and telling him that she knew, he might have believed she hadn't heard him at all.

He grinned. Maybe that party and getting himself in the middle of everyone's attentions for once might not be so bad, after all.

* * *

At 12, Grimmauld Place, Mia reached inside a cardboard box to get a star ornament that was destined to the top of the Christmas tree in her and Sirius's room. They'd grown used to having plenty of trees in the house: one in their room, which usually was only up to the two of them to decorate, other in the living room for the whole family to take care of and another in the dining room, Kreacher's responsibility although Izzy usually ended up helping him with it. It had originally been Sirius's idea to have them all over the place. '_Christmas is everywhere, love, so should trees_' he'd claimed. At least, she thought, only the one in the living room was an actual tree, while the others were Muggle plastic ones, or else someday there wouldn't be trees left for anyone.

That year, since she was almost too large to even reach the higher branches without bumping her belly into them, Sirius had recruited Alex as his personal assistant during the decorations, while she was in charge of sitting on the bed, picking the decorations and dictating where they went. It had, by far, been the best time she'd had in months, watching her little boy giggling in delight every time Sirius lifted him up to place the ornaments sloppily on their respective branches.

"There you go, honey," she said, passing the star ornament to Alex and placing a kiss to his chubby cheek. "Remember that's not to eat, baby."

With an oddly serious expression on his face, Alex nodded. "Tate bah," he said thoughtfully.

"Cookies are so much better, aren't they, mate?" Sirius told his son, picking him up. "The crispy ones with chocolate chips."

"Whew cookies?" the little boy asked, looking around for them.

Mia shook her head. "Not here, honey. You can have one after dinner if you're a good boy," she promised.

"Now, how about we put that star on top of the tree?" Sirius suggested, pointing at the specific location, which was only a foot opposite his face. "Right there."

"Up?" the toddler asked.

"Up-est," Sirius told him in their own code.

After the successful placing of the star, Alex looked rather proud of himself and ran to Mia just as Sirius let him down. "Baby!" he said, looking at Mommy's big belly, resting the side of his face, trying to listen to what his little sibling was up to.

Mia rubbed his hair. "I think the baby's napping right now, honey. Just a little longer before it comes." According to Elizabeth, two or three more weeks at the most, though there shouldn't be any problem if the baby came at any point from there. If Mia didn't trust her best friend as a healer and hadn't been trained as one too, she could have called her a liar and said the kid should have arrived at least two weeks before. She couldn't see her own toes or carry her son anymore since she was so big, not to mention those blasted back aches and swollen ankles. She felt like an elephant lately.

"Can pway?" he asked, looking up at her hopefully. "Like Dashy?"

He actually meant Darcy Finnigan. Her grandparents, the O'Dells, had come over earlier that afternoon in order to thank them for letting them use the Wales house, bringing the little girl in a tow. Even if there was still something sad about her, little Darcy looked a lot better than she had before, right after her parent's deaths. She didn't quite understand, her grandmother had said when they'd talked bit. But one thing was for sure: she'd gotten much more cheerful after she and Alex had gotten over the shyness and taken to play with each other for a while. Though she was four months younger than Alex, Darcy was nearly as fast on her little legs as he was and the youngest Black appeared to like having a competitor of his own size. Later, the O'Dells had left with a promise of bringing their granddaughter over every once in a while, concluding a friend was exactly what she needed.

"Not yet, honey," Mia responded. "The baby will be really tiny when it comes out. You've got to wait for it to get bigger."

Alex didn't have a chance to be too disappointed about that as he got more interested in the lights that Sirius had cast all over the tree before he came to stand against one of the bed's posters.

"The little bugger's having the time of his life," he said with laugh.

"He's not the only one," she said, smiling back as she raised a hand to him. "Help me up?" she requested. Simple tasks just as that one were starting to become a problem. Her maternity leave had arrived just in time or else she'd end up humiliating herself at Hogwarts by getting stuck on a chair or something.

He promptly assisted her, pressing a soft kiss to her lips just as he succeeded on getting her to her feet. "There you go, love. The little one is getting kind of cramped in there, isn't it?"

"Very," she confirmed. "I love being pregnant, I really do, but I wouldn't mind getting this kid out of me before Christmas so I wouldn't be so _useless_."

"You're far from useless, love. Just a little… conditioned these days. It's not like you can't help around – Molly promised she'd let you peel the potatoes on Christmas Eve," he pointed out. Due to Mia's condition, Molly Weasley had offered to have them all over for Christmas and New Year's, an idea that had been very welcomed by the kids and the Weasleys in general, who loved a good old messy Christmas.

She huffed. "That's as good as nothing. I'm a witch. I can have potatoes peeled without lifting a finger."

"Well, maybe you should use the Muggle way this time around then, then," he suggested mildly, winning himself a glare from Mia in return

And suddenly, as Sirius was about to say something else, there was a knock on the open door, which had then both turning to face it and Alex running happily to the people standing there. It was Remus and Tonks.

"Wotcher, guys," the Metamorphagus greeted the cheerfully, reaching down to pick up the little boy, placing a kiss on his cheek, which initiated a fit of giggling from his part.

"Kreacher told us to just come in," Remus said. "Hope we're not interrupting anything."

Mia shook her head. "Never mind that. Come on in."

"Nice tree," Tonks said, grinning at the Christmas tree standing in the corner of the room. "Ours is nicer. Tell them what it's got on it, Remus?"

He huffed and gave Sirius a don't-you-dare-laugh warning look. "Half-naked Father Christmases."

"They sing dirty Christmas carols when we ask them," Tonks described proudly.

Ignoring his friend's earlier warning, Sirius didn't even try to hold his laughter at that, same with Mia. That was about the last thing they'd ever picure being in Remus Lupin's flat. Only Tonks… "Where on Earth did you get them?" Sirius asked.

His cousin grinned as Alec grabbed a handful of her hair. "Charlie Weasley gave them to me last year – he brought them from Romania."

"Priceless. Just priceless. So," he let out a breath, ending the laughter, "what brings you guys to our humble residence?"

"Just dropping by for a visit," Remus replied, slightly nervous.

"Just a visit my…" she glanced at the toddler on her arms and concluded profanity might not be a good idea "…behind," she finished, turning to Sirius. "Remus here wants to talk to you about something and doesn't want me to know about it."

"It's not that I don't want you to know, Dora…"

"Yeah, yeah," she said dismissively. "You're lucky I have a thing for mysterious blokes." But she knew that if it was too serious, he'd tell her.

"Well, since we're not welcome here," Mia said, making her way to her husband's cousin, "we'll just go downstairs to the kitchen and smuggle some of today's desert before dinner. I think Kreacher was making an apple tart…"

"Apple tart… I'm so in," the Metamorphagus said as she and Mia left the room along with little Alex, leaving the two Marauders behind by themselves.

"Well?" Sirius inquired.

Remus reached for his wand and pointed it to the door, closing it and casting a Muffliato charm. Then, there was a moment of silence before he spoke. "I got her a ring."

"For Christmas?" Sirius asked, not quite getting the meaning of his friend's words. "If you want my opinion of it, I don't know that much about jewellery. You might want to ask Mia…"

"An engagement ring," the werewolf specified.

"Oh. That sort of ring." More silence. "When are you gonna ask her?"

"I have no idea. I didn't even know I was going to do it in the first place until I went into Gringotts this morning to make a withdrawal and came out with my mother's engagement in my pocket. This is mad!"

"No, it's not. She's your girlfriend, you live with her, you love her and she's great. Sum that all together and you want to marry her. What's mad in that?"

"I'm a werewolf – werewolves _don't_ get married," Remus stated.

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Please tell me we're not going down this road _again_, for Merlin's sake. She doesn't give a damn you're a werewolf and there's nothing in the law against them marrying. I checked."

Remus was surprised for a moment. "You did?"

"Yeah. When I first noticed you went all gooey-eyed for Tonks, I got curious and asked Dumbledore about it. And if he knows it, so do you. Who cares if werewolves don't _usually_ get married? Neither do formerly escaped convicts and here I am with an eight-and-a-half-month pregnant wife."

"Many people may care. This may get Dora into trouble at the ministry…"

"Then tell them to piss off. You're freaking out, mate."

"I know!" Remus said. Everything had seemed so simple when he'd picked up the ring from Gringotts: he loved Tonks, he wanted to stay with her forever. Marrying her would be just great. But as soon as he'd come out, the real world had hit him like a train.

"You don't have to ask her today or tomorrow just because you've got the ring," Sirius told him. "I had a ring for weeks before I decided to ask Mia. And I freaked out too – James got an earful out of it, believe me." And even then, he hadn't even been able to ask her because she had to go into hiding… "Anyway, my point is that it's okay to freak out for a while. Just don't over-think it. Everyone knows she lives with you, anyway – if Tonks had to get problems at the ministry, that would have already happened, don't you think?"

Remus couldn't counter that logic. And that made him calm down slightly. "So, you think it's a good idea?"

Sirius grinned. "I think it's a _brilliant_ idea. Want my advice? Get her to the ministry and marry her just as soon as she accepts the proposal. Before you've got a chance to over-think it again, you know? I suppose I can work with a post-wedding bachelor party."

"Here we go…" Remus said under his breath. "Last time you arranged a bachelor party, James spent the whole morning of his wedding day getting to know a toilet."

He snorted at the memory. "I know. I should have probably watered down that firewhiskey… Amateur's mistake. Won't happen again." There was a silent pause when the werewolf looked thoughtful. "She'll probably ask you herself if you don't," Sirius pointed out. "Tonks is the type that isn't afraid of taking matters into her own hands."

"I know," Remus admitted, letting out a sigh.

"You'll be ready to pop the question when you're done freaking out, mate," Sirius assured him. Proud of his own advice, Sirius clapped his old friend's back. "Now, since the ladies are downstairs already attacking desert, it's only logical that you guys stay over for dinner too. I suppose we start discussing the numbers for that bachelor party afterwards."

"I'm not having a bachelor party," Remus told him. "I'm not even engaged"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "_Yet_. And it's not like you have a choice, Moony. I'll have the twins drugging you if I have to."

"That's illegal."

"Only if we get caught," he pointed nonchalantly as he headed out, whistling the tune of a wedding march, for his friend's frustration.

In only all the problems in the world involved wedding proposals…

**A/N: As promised, a lighter chapter this week. Hope you all liked it. Now, i've got to go back to write the most boring school paper ever. Feedback is welcome, as always! Review!**


	11. New Year

Spending New Year's Eve sitting on a sofa doing essentially nothing but being pregnant would have been boring for Mia Black if she hadn't been right in the middle of a Weasley celebration at the Burrow. Honestly, she thought, who could have been bored with all the shouting, laughing and the million conversations that happened at the same time everywhere?

Between herself, Sirius and the kids, all the Weasleys, excluding Percy and Bill, Remus and Tonks, Lulu and Gabe and a handful of other people, which included dates and more friends of the family, the welcoming of the year of 1997 had had been one hell of a mess and Mia had loved every minute of it. She'd spent some enjoyable time talking to her friends, thought, along with Lulu, a Muggle card game they used to play when she was little to Arthur Weasley, and even had a chance to snog her husband when midnight sounded and the New Year started. By the time it was over and most people had already gone home, she was both delighted and exhausted.

"Maybe you should stay until the morning and rest a little," a concerned Molly Weasley told Mia half an hour into the New Year as she stood in front of the Burrow's fireplace, ready to go back home. "I just don't think it's safe for you to take the floo if you're tired, dear."

Mia smiled and shook her head. "I'm not that tired, Molly," she lied, not very smoothly. "My back just hurts a little, which I suppose must be normal because of all this weight," she told her, patting the large bump.

"It can't be much longer, can it?" the redhead asked her.

"Elizabeth calculated the due date for next Saturday but we all know babies don't usually care about that," Mia pointed out.

"I was nearly two-weeks overdue when it was Ron's turn," Molly told her. "Lazy even to be born, that boy. Anyway, one day I just got up and said '_young man, either you get out of there on your own will or I'll have to make you!'_ Less than a day later, he was born."

Mia chuckled. "If this little one gets that far, maybe I'll give your way a try," she promised. "But there really is no need for me to stay, Molly. I'm perfectly alright. Besides, you'll have your hands full with Harry and Izzy staying here tonight."

Molly waved her hand dismissively. "Oh, you know they're no trouble. Bill is in France with the Delacours – you and Sirius can perfectly take his room for one night. No need to risk a bad landing out of the fireplace – Merlin knows that wouldn't be any good for the baby…"

"Sirius hasn't let me floo anywhere alone for the past weeks, Molly. He'll side with me as soon as he comes back," Mia assured her. Sirius had headed home ahead of her with little Alex so he could put their sleeping son to bed before coming back to get her. She might have complained about that side-flooing arrangement a few months before but, honestly, nowadays magical transportation in general made her a bit nervous since it wasn't infrequent for people to end up sprawled on the floor after a missed landing – not a good idea with a bump as big as hers. "You know how protective he gets of the baby."

Molly sighed but nodded. "Ah, well, if you're sure…" she said in defeat. "Just promise me you'll send a Patronus back as soon as you arrive. It would give me a little peace of mind knowing you'd gotten home safely."

"I promise, Molly," Mia told her with a smile just as the sound of vibrant shouts coming from the outside increased, followed by a bunch of high, mocking voices.

"Oh, don't tell me they're still not done with that blasted snowball fight," the redheaded woman said, shaking her head as she made her way closer to the kitchen's window, followed by Mia. "It's past midnight, for Merlin's sake!"

"It's New Year's, Molly. They're having fun," Mia replied with a smile.

Looking out the window, she saw Harry and Ron reconstructing a partly ruined snow fort as, several feet opposite them, Charlie Weasley and one of the twins hurriedly made snowballs, dropping them on a large pile by their side. Izzy and Ginny weren't far away, the first hiding behind a tree covering from attacks and the other carefully moving towards her older brothers, clearly planning to ambush them. Mia imagined Harry, Ron, Ginny and Izzy were forming a team against Charlie and the twins, though one of them was still missing.

At some point, Ron grabbed a handful of snow and made it into a ball, throwing it tamely at his brothers, who laughed at the attempt, which revealed itself as a distraction when Ginny literally jumped on top of them. At the same time, the missing twin – Mia has no idea if he was Fred or George – showed up behind Izzy out of nowhere and grabbed her by the waist, lifting her from the floor and bringing her to the centre of the battlefield to use her as a shield. Izzy didn't remain passive, though, letting out a scream and kicking and elbowing her kidnapper.

Huffing, Molly opened the window, letting out a breeze of freezing winter air, and poked her head out as Mia let out a laugh. "George, you put that girl down right now! You're twice her size – you'll hurt her!"

"No, I won't, Mom – she's a light-weight. One barely needs to use force to lift he…"

A successfully placed elbow in the ribs and a head-blow against his chin had him biting his own tongue and shouting a string of profanities out loud, which had Izzy grinning triumphantly and asking '_who's the light-weight now?_', though the older boy still didn't drop her.

"_If I ever hear those words come out of your mouth again, George Fabian Weasley, I'll jinx your tongue together with the roof of your mouth!_" Molly yelled furiously before turning to Ginny, who was busy pinning Fred on the ground, over what used to be her older brothers' fort, and yelling at him to forfeit as Charlie struggled to escape the snowballs thrown by Harry and Ron.

"What did I miss?" Sirius's voice came from behind Mia, who hadn't even noticed him flooing over.

"The snowball fight has just turned into a vicious battle," Mia whispered with a smile as he wrapped one arm around her back, standing by her side.

"Well, look at that," he said in amusement. He reached for the window and gave his best to make himself sound angry as he shouted outside. "Hey, Weasley! Whose daughter do you think you're using as a shield? I ought to go out there and kick your arse!"

Instead of George, who was too busy avoiding Izzy's kicks, Charlie was the one replying for his brother. "All's fair in war, Sirius!" And following that thought, he reached for his wand and pointed at a tree behind Harry and Ron, causing all the snow that had been piled on the branches to fall on top of the two boys, catching them by surprise.

"Hey!" Harry yelled as he dug himself out of the snow pile. "That's cheating!"

"Yeah! We're underage – we can't use magic!" Ron agreed.

Charlie snorted. "Too bad! You guys had an extra team-member!"

Ginny, unsatisfied by her brother's reasons, used Charlie's distraction to pull the back of his winter cloak, creating a gap between his clothes and his skin, and shoved a handful of snow down his back which had him jumping at the cold and cursing her very existence.

Fuming, Molly Weasley yelled at them. "Alright, everyone inside and to bed! _Now_! I can't believe I have raised a bunch of savages!"

Outside, both teams groaned and unsuccessfully tried to change the matriarch's mind. They ended up promising a rematch for the following morning when they concluded they wouldn't be successful and had to break the fight up temporarily.

"Your hair is all covered with snow," Ginny said with a laugh as she approached her boyfriend on their way into the house.

Harry grunted. "I know. It's melting all over my neck," he mumbled with a shiver, trying to get it out.

"Head down," she ordered in order to help him get the snow off and then using the Gryffindor scarf around his neck to dry it a little. "There. We'll get them back for that tomorrow," she promised him before they walked arm in arm into the warmness of the Burrow.

"Lil' minx almost had me hacking half my tongue out," George was complaining, mock-glaring at Izzy as Harry and Ginny closed the door behind them.

Sirius proudly rested a hand on his daughter's shoulder and grinned. "That's my girl. Give 'em a fight," he told his daughter as Molly left the kitchen, hurrying Charlie into the nearest bathroom to help him dry the melting snow all over his back. "You know, next time you guys make a snowball fight and I'm around, I want in," he informed them all.

"Fine by us," Fred told him. "We'd never refuse a chance to have a Marauder in our team."

"You mean _our_ team," Ginny corrected. "He's Izzy's dad and Harry's godfather, which naturally would give us the first call."

"Except you guys already have four members," George pointed out.

"Well, you can keep Ron if you want to," she stated.

Her brother was caught by surprise. "Hey! Why me?"

"Because you're the oldest of our side and, honestly, because our team doesn't care for guys with lame nicknames such as Won-Won and annoying girlfriends," his sister spat back. "It's a matter of principle."

Mia chuckled. "Well, I guess we'll just leave you to fight over Sirius and tell us the results later. We were just heading home."

"Oh, right now?" Harry asked.

"It will be one in the morning in twenty minutes," Mia told her, rubbing her stomach. "The baby needs a little rest, I reckon."

Bidding them goodnight, Izzy took a step to approach her parents, pressed a kiss to each of their cheeks and wished them a Happy New Year and Harry did the same, though he replaced the kisses with a couple of more boyish hugs.

After a bunch of warnings to behave directed to their kids and a quick farewell with the Weasleys, Sirius stepped into the fireplace, his arms firmly circling his wife's form in order to provide her with support, and the two flooed away, headed home. They successfully landed straight into the kitchen and only then he loosened his grip on Mia, picking her up from the floor instead and pressing a kiss to her lips. "Happy New Year," he whispered as he took her up to their room.

"Hum, I was under the impression we'd already had our 'Happy New Year' kiss," Mia pointed out, smiling. She would have protested about him carrying her but it felt so comfortable and she was so sick of walking…

"One can never have too many of these, can they?"

"I guess not," she agreed. "Is Alex all tucked in? Did he wake up when you brought him?"

"Yes, he's tucked in, and no, he didn't wake up. That kid sleeps like the dead – didn't even notice when I changed him into his pyjamas," Sirius informed her, entering their room. "And now, I'll change his Mummy into her nightgown and I'll tuck her into bed. How about that?"

"Doesn't sound all that bad," she agreed as he sat her down on the edge of their bed. "This is gonna be a rough year, isn't it?"

Yes, it was, Sirius thought. Everything seemed to be pointing that way. "All years are rough," he offered, looking down as he helped her out of her shoes. As his mind came up with a silver lining, he looked up and gave her a smile. "We sure will have our hands full between the nappies and the sleepless nights, hum?" As he motioned to stand, he pressed his lips to her belly softly.

The corners of her mouth curled and, for a moment, he was sure he had succeeded in getting her mind off the dark thoughts. "Two teenagers, a toddler and a newborn," she said. "That's going to be quite a challenging ride."

"I always liked a good challenge. I'm sure I'll especially like this one."

She smiled even more widely. "Yeah, me too." And minutes later, when they lay together in bed and the lights were turned off, Mia slept peacefully with no sign of the other, darker, challenges that were ahead of them.

* * *

She woke up suddenly at half past three in the morning, probably in the most uncomfortable way possible. Through the shock of gaining complete consciousness so abruptly, she noted that her lower back felt as if somebody was breaking it as did her abdomen. It didn't take her more than a second to realize she was having a contraction – a ridiculously painful and long one. "Crap," she managed to gasp through her teeth before it started to subside several seconds later and let herself take a long, deep breath.

It had been unbelievably strong, considering she'd just started feeling the labour pains – could she have slept through the whole first part of it? No, of course not. She wasn't such a heavy sleeper. It was happening fast, that was the only explanation. And she wasn't sure if she should feel relieved or nervous about it…

Glancing at the Sirius's form in the bed, she felt her head boiling with anger. _He'd slept through the whole thing_! "Bastard," Mia hissed bitterly. How unfair was that? She was right there, still catching her breath from one hell of a contraction caused by the impending birth of his kid and the guy was just lying by her side, enjoying the delights of calm, careless sleep. Well, if she'd gotten a rude awakening, so was he, she decided, shoving her elbow into his ribs so hard that he nearly rolled out of bed with the shock. Mia imagined, in spiteful delight, that in whatever dream he'd been having, her husband had all of a sudden been ran over by the Hogwarts Express or a herd of centaurs.

Sirius's eyes were startled when he came awake, suddenly looking everywhere, completely confused. "Wha… what the… where's the attack?" He looked at his wife and saw her glaring, which only confused him further. "What?"

She didn't let herself soften up by the label of 'cute' that she gave to his confusion in the back of her mind, keeping the glare intact. "There's no attack, you _idiot_!"

"Then what? It's three-something in the morning," he mumbled, still not quite alert.

"What do you think? I'm in labour!" she snapped.

"In… oooh," he mumbled, realization dawning. Then, his face lit up slightly. "The baby's coming."

"What are you smiling ab…" She suddenly pursed her lips and her whole face tensed, her hand grasping the bed sheets as another contraction hit her. She felt the bed moving and, before she knew it, Sirius was sitting on the edge of her side of the bed, one arm around her back as he pulled her against him for comfort and his hand in hers so she could grasp it. It didn't help much with the uncomfortable pain but it did ease her nerves and her temper a bit. When she let out another relieved breath, afterwards, he was shoving his pillow behind her back and looking at her in concern.

"You okay?" he asked her, his face half-buried in her hair.

"Been better," Mia replied, not letting go of his hand. "Get Elizabeth here, okay? Tell her to hurry because I don't think this baby is going to make us wait very long. It's coming fast."

"How fast?" he asked nervously.

"Fast," she repeated.

He really didn't want to leave her side for a single second in an occasion like that – he wanted to make sure she was alright – but he just couldn't wrap his mind around the fact that she might end up having the kid without Elizabeth there to help. "Okay. I'll go downstairs and floo her." He didn't even remember he could simply send her a Patronus from right where he stood…

"And cast an imperturbable charm around Alex's room. I don't want him to wake up with me screaming bloody murder."

"But will you be okay here by yourself? I can call out for Kreacher…"

Mia shook her head. "No need. Just don't take long and get your arse back here as soon as you're done," she added firmly as he was about to get up. "Hey," she called him back before he had a chance to actually do it. "Whatever I say from now on, remember that I'll probably love you again by the time this is all over."

He smiled and couldn't resist having his lips touching hers in a very soft kiss. "I know." Then, he pressed another kiss to her forehead. "I'll be right back, love. If you think the baby's about to come out…"

"I'll use all the insults I can remember," she tried to joke.

"Yeah, you do that," he mumbled.

And as he hurried out of the room, Mia's hand softly caressed her belly and she let out a sigh, followed by a smile. That baby was about to get out of her. _Thank Merlin, _she thought. Another week feeling like an enormous walrus and she'd have sold herself to the nearest zoo for a bargain. A new year followed by a new baby – she should have known. Blacks did have a tendency to make grand entrances into the world right around special occasions: Izzy a few days before Christmas, Alex in the eve of hers and Sirius's birthday and baby number three in New Year's Day. "Be a good baby and come out just easily, okay? Mommy's tired."

The answer was another contraction and she groaned, not sure of how to interpret it. A temper, she thought. Typical…

* * *

"You were in a hurry, weren't you, little one?" Sirius asked in a whisper as he rocked the tiny blanket-wrapped form, pacing along the hall right outside his and Mia's room. "Gave Mommy and Daddy quite a jolt."

The baby let out a little whimper but didn't start crying, instead opening those sleepy newborn blue eyes to look up at Sirius, making him smile. He might have been kicked out of the room by Elizabeth so she and her trainee (Melanie? Mabel? He just couldn't remember the girl's name) could help Mia 'freshen up', but at least they'd let him come out in good company. His heart had one more owner now – that tiny little bundle of joy, so soft and warm that it seemed to melt in his arms. _A hundred times worth the wait,_ he thought with a proud grin.

A miniature arm managed to sneak out of the yellow blanket, revealing the soft white bodysuit the trainee had dressed the baby with, and flung itself against the air above before Sirius got a hold of it, admiring how little the hand seemed. Poor thing – the baby had looked rather stunned right after being born so fast. The little one had waited a couple of seconds to figure out what the heck had just happened before showing him and Mia what a great pair of lungs it owned by wailing like there was no tomorrow. His soul had shaken all over at that sound, pride and elation running through his veins.

When she opened the room's door and poked her head out, Elizabeth Harper smiled at the picture in front of her. She could never accuse that guy of not loving his children. The look in his eyes right then was of pure adoration. "Hey, you with the kid," she called Sirius. "Mia's demanding the baby back, since she was the one who had to go through those _very_ painful three hours of labour."

"She wasn't the only one who was in pain – she actually broke my hand this time!" he replied in a soft tone, trying not to startle the newborn, who he kept observing with delight.

The healer laughed. "Yeah, and you didn't notice until I told you so – hopefully she won't remember any of this and conclude that you've clearly numbed your hand… again."

He looked up in alarm. "Shh, Harper! Mia may hear you!" Sirius warned her, walking his into the room as the blonde chuckled at his terror. "Sadist," he hissed at her.

"Yes. I live to give you grief," she replied sarcastically.

When the bed came into his view, Mia was lying in it, smiling tiredly as she saw him arriving with their baby. "Can I hold my daughter now or will you simply monopolize her for the rest of her life?" she asked, forcing an annoyed look onto her face.

He smiled as he sat on the edge of their bed. "I think I'm hooked for life all over again." There was that little girl, barely half-an-hour old, and he knew he could die for her. He could _kill_ for her. He wanted her to be around forever. "This one will never… ever date."

"That's what you used to say about Izzy when you learned about her," Mia pointed out as her husband passed her the baby. She looked down at her daughter and, once again, counted the little girl's fingers just to make sure she'd been right the first time and there were actually five on each hand… It seemed unreal that the baby she'd carried round for nine months was right there in her arms – even more unreal that that had been the baby she'd feared having lost because of that battle at the Department of Mysteries. Miracle or not, now she had a perfectly healthy baby in her arms.

"Well, Izzy already owned a wand when we met," he said. "As much as I love her, I have a feeling that one possesses a hidden nerve that would allow her to hex _me_, her beloved father, if I pushed the wrong buttons…"

Elizabeth joined in and snorted. "Well, she's _your_ daughter – it's only natural Izzy may have inherited part of your lack of _respect_," the healer told him with a glare, continuing before he had a chance to spit back some answer. "Well, I'll leave you guys alone for a moment to enjoy your daughter. I need to take Mabel to the fireplace so she can go home and to make a floo call or two…"

"I'll give you the lack of respect…" he mumbled as the healer shook her head and exited the room along with her trainee, leaving the two of them alone with the baby. "She's all annoyed at me because I nearly walked in on her with some bloke. It's not my fault she wouldn't answer the call and I had to physically floo her home… it was an emergency. I had no idea her father had taken her kids to his place so she could have her 'date'."

Mia looked interested. "Did you see who it was?"

He shook his head. "I didn't actually enter the room… Though I think his voice sounded familiar. Can't place it, though…"

"It wasn't Ludo Bagman was it?" his wife asked, recalling that it wouldn't be the first time her friend ended up in bed with her ex husband.

"I don't think so…" He shrugged. "You know what? Let's quit talking about Elizabeth's… 'adventures'. It will corrupt our little Mary."

Mia looked at him in surprise. "Mary?"

"Well, you said I would be the one to pick her name. It took me a while, but I settled with Mary. After one of my favourite women in the world and probably also one of the first I've ever loved."

She gave him a doubtful look – hadn't the guy been telling her for years _she_'d been the first he'd ever loved. "Is there something I should know about?" she asked stiffly.

Sirius grinned. "Don't get all jealous, woman. I meant Judy Potter, James's mother. She was as good as mine too." He sighed thoughtfully. "Hell of a woman, that one. Anyway, as Judith sounded kind of old-fashioned, I went for her middle name, which is always classic. Do you like it?"

Over the little burst of jealousy, she felt touched by his reasons. "I think I do. Mary Black has a nice ring on it." Her daughter… Mary. Yes, it sounded perfect. She reached down and placed a kiss on the newborn's forehead, making the baby shift slightly. "What about the middle name? Are you still sticking with Elizabeth?"

He frowned slightly. "Yeah, about that… I kind of changed my mind. Mary Elizabeth just makes her sound so… goody two shoes. Blacks are far from _goody. _What do you think of Mary Harper Black instead? It still counts as naming her after Elizabeth."

"Merlin, you are a mess with the naming thing, aren't you?" his wife asked in an amused tone.

"Yeah, I guess," he admitted with a laugh. "Well, you're the one who made me do it. And you _still_ haven't said if you liked it."

"I love it, Sirius." Carefully holding the baby with just one arm, Mia used her other hand to cup his face before reaching to kiss him. "I love _you_. And our babies: every single one of them. I'm just so happy right now."

He chuckled. "Join the club, love," he told her. "And now that we've named this little princess, what about her godparents? We didn't really speak of that before."

"No, we didn't. But why do I feel like you already have a couple of candidates in mind?"

He grinned, stretching by her side on the bed so he was lying down too. "Which couple that we know and love is in need of a push to get themselves into a deeper stage of commitment?"

Mia sighed. "Remus and Tonks . You'll never leave them alone, will you?"

"That's exactly what makes me a great friend to them. Come on, nothing says 'just go ahead and propose to her already' like handing them a goddaughter to share," he said, reaching to offer a finger for his little girl to grasp when she started whimpering for attention. "Plus Tonks will make a great godmother – Mary here will have the time of her life with her around and since Moony is Alex's godfather too, he'll tag along. Free babysitting all around. What do you say?"

Mia sighed. "Well, Tonks is one of the few members of your family that I like and I suppose she'd be a positive influence around Mary…"

He sighed, looking proudly at the girl in question. "Our little girl's a beautiful baby. Despite the wrinkling and the reddish colour, I mean. The kids are in for one hell of a surprise – bet they weren't expecting to get a sister for New Year's."

"You should probably owl the Burrow telling them."

Sirius shook his head, smirking. "Oh, I have a much better way planned to tell them." He looked up to face her. "You look tired, love. Why don't you sleep a little now and let Daddy handle the parenting for a while?"

She was about to deny that she was tired but the yawn that came out of her mouth gave her away. "Alright, maybe I could rest a little," she offered, lying further down after Sirius carefully removed the baby from her arms. "Wake me up when Alex gets out of bed, will you?"

"Hum, hum," he said, nodding.

"And don't let Mary get cold," Mia added, full of motherly worry. "Keep the blanket around her."

"Don't worry, Mommy," he said, tightening the blanket around the little girl just in case. It occurred to him how amazing it was that less than five years before, he'd been a desperate bloke running away from prison hoping, only hoping, that the woman he loved had waited for him. Now, there he was with her lying by his side, holding his newborn child for the second time in his life. "It's great having a family, you know, Mary?"

The baby yawned, relaxing against her father's arms and drifting slowly to sleep as her mother had, oblivious to what he's said.

He wished he could be that innocent and careless and not know how messed up the world they lived in was. Maybe it wouldn't be so messed up by the time Mary was old enough to walk. Maybe she and Alex would grow in a peaceful world. Certainly, if he needed another reason to fight for it, he was holding her right now. He couldn't really complain, Sirius concluded – he had more than enough reasons to fight and to hope, he had complete trust in the boy in whose hands the fate of the world rested on and, all in all, he was a pretty happy bloke.

And with that thought in his mind, Sirius black watched his newborn daughter sleep with a smile on his face.

**A/N: So, after around eleven chapters of pregnancy, the youngest Black makes an entrance into the world. Hope you all liked it! Feedback is welcome. Review!**


	12. Home

The beach was nearly deserted around him and the only sound that could be heard beside the waves crashing on the sand was the soft murmur of children's laughter somewhere in the distance.

Sirius grinned as he rested stretched on the sand, wearing a faded black pair of swim shorts. He could probably live like that forever – with his family in that calm, warm world under the bright sun and right by the water. Yes, that would be one hell of a life: Izzy would be far away from boys, Harry would be far away from touble, Alex could run around on the beach as much as he wanted, his little Mary… well, she'd have to wait a few more months before enjoying a relocation to the beach-side home. As for him… well, that's wasn't a hard one to guess.

As if an answer to the thought in his mind, he felt the touch of warm, satin-like skin against his own. He didn't need to move his face an inch in order to know what it was – who it was. His body had been built to recognize Mia's for a long time.

"Knut for your thoughts," she whispered playfully into his ear before shifting her body so, while she was kneeling in front of him, her legs would straddle his outstretched ones.

His breath caught for a second as he watched her right in front of him in wonder. Her dark brown hair came tumbling in soft waves against her pale skin and, under the loose white dress flowing with the wind, her curves were soft against her firm – impossibly firm for someone who'd had a baby so recently, though he wouldn't think of it until later – body. "How about you keep the knut and I take the rest for myself?" he asked her suggestively as his hands gripped her hips gently.

Mia smiled, the brown of her eyes sparkling as it met his grey ones. "You can take anything you want," she replied, reaching to press her lips fervently against his.

He let himself fall until his back was resting against the sand, bringing her down with him so her body was fully covering his. Sirius's hands roamed up and down her sides as his lips kept moving against hers passionately, like he's been starving for her form months – it felt like years, actually.

Just as he was about to reach for the zipper of her dress, an odd sensation of suddenly being shaken awake took him over. _What the hell?_ He thought, pulling his lips away from Mia's. Was that an earthquake? No, Mia didn't seem to have felt that at all…

As the feeling persisted, the sensation of his wife's body over his began to weaken and she started to fade in front of him. In fact, the whole picture of the beach and the shinning sun begun to fade away, only to be replaced by his and Mia's darkened room, making him groan.

He'd been dreaming. Of course he had. Unless he'd somehow managed to get himself on some tropical island all of a sudden, sunny beaches would be impossible to find anywhere within apparating range on New Year's Day, not to mention that Mia had just had a baby – no shagging for Daddy during the following six weeks, he thought dramatically. Such an interesting, delightful dream… he and imaginary-Mia had been so close to heaven… Why did it have to be over? Why?

When he noticed the responsible for that unfortunate awakening standing right opposite him, Sirius turned on his best – or was it worst? – glare, shooting daggers at the blasted living thing. It had to have been Kreacher, obviously…

"I am going… to kill you," Sirius murmured through his teeth, noting from the corner of his eye that the alarm clock indicated it was 9 in the morning. He'd slept little more than two hours, totalling around five if he counted the ones he'd slept before Mia had gone to labour.

The house-elf seemed to be pretty immune to his intimidation as it was common sense that, these days, Sirius's nearly inexistent threats to him were never really meant. Most of the time, they merely acted rudely to fill in the role of each other's adversary – it was a matter of habit, after all. "Young Master Alex be awake," Kreacher informed him simply. "Master ask Kreacher to warn."

Seeing there had been a valid reason for having been woken up didn't soften Sirius's temper much – deep down, he believed the little bastard had been somehow watching his dream, only to wake him up exactly in the worst moment. "Fine, I'll go take care of him," he murmured irritably before glancing over his shoulder.

Real-world-Mia was peacefully asleep on her side of the bed, right next to the bassinet that he knew to contain their two-and-a-half-hour-old baby girl. It occurred to Sirius, as he motioned to get up from the bed, that having… hot dreams Mia while their newborn daughter was in the room felt sort of unholy. _You really are a shameless pig, aren't you, Black?_ he thought for a moment before forcing himself to simply forget that matter.

When he turned to Kreacher again, planning to warn him out of making noise on his way out, Sirius saw that the house-elf was already gone. How the hell had he left without him noticing? "Freaky bastard," he mumbled under his breath as he stood up and reached for his black robe before circling the bed in order to go check on Mary.

As he moved to stand right next to the bassinet, he saw his baby daughter sleeping peacefully in it, dressed in warm footie pyjamas, with her little arms raised up over her head. That lovely picture had him smiling widely immediately. She just looked so tiny, so perfect and he really, really felt like picking her up and just holding her for hours. But he didn't – waking up the baby would probably not be a very good idea at that moment, not to mention that he had a little boy in the room right next to that one waiting for him to show up and to tell him that, as of a few hours ago, he had a baby sister.

Softly, he brushed his thumb against his daughter's unbelievably small curled fist, giving her a final smile as he turned his attention to her mother. Mia was also asleep, likely still exhausted from the labour even though it had happened surprisingly fast. Moving the bassinet carefully so he could reach Mia, he pressed a soft kiss to his wife's forehead, which had her mumbling his name under her breath and shift her head in her sleep so it was slightly facing his side of the bed just as he walked out feeling in a pretty great mood.

As he stepped into his son's room, Sirius quickly concluded that Alex's mood was more to the daring side that morning, as he stood up in his cot, apparently getting ready to try to climb out of the rail, his face with a very concentrated expression on it.

"Ah, not so fast, you little monster," Sirius said, mock-glaring at his son. "You know the rules mate: just because Daddy broke out of a big bad prison, doesn't mean you're allowed to do the same with your cot. Little rebel."

"Shwaffas fall," the little boy said, pointing sadly at his favourite toy, the black stuffed dog that mimicked his father's animagus form. "Gimme, Daddy."

So that was why the kid was trying to escape, Sirius thought, picking up the toy from the floor and offering it back to his son, who grinned as he accepted it. "Bet you wish you could make a summoning charm, hum?" His son seemed confused at the meaning of 'summoning'. Then again, the kid was still far from being able to do magic. Even the accidental kind rarely happened before a child turned three years old.

Suddenly forgetting his own confusion, Alex looked around. "Whew's Mama?" he asked. She usually always came with his father what it was time for him to get up

"Mummy's asleep, mate," Sirius said, lifting Alex to let him out of the cot. "Guess what, mate? You're a big brother now."

"Baby home?" the little boy asked, receiving a nod from his father in return. He'd learned, from the bed stories that Sirius and Mia had been reading to him lately, to relate the idea of being a big brother to the arrival of the new baby. "Whew?"

"She's sleeping like Mummy," he told Alex. "She's a girl, you know? Your little sister. Her name is Mary."

"Sissy Mawy?" he asked, curious."Baby!"

Sirius nodded. "That's right, mate. Do you wanna go and see her?"

The little boy nodded eagerly. "Wanna see baby, Daddy."

His father grinned proudly, carrying Alex out of the room. "Then see her, we will. But you have to be really quiet, okay? Mummy's tired and she needs to sleep a little longer." He lifted his index finger to cover his lips. "No noise."

Alex mimicked his father, covering lips with the same finger and blowing a quiet 'shhhh', which let his father know he'd understood.

"That's my boy," Sirius proudly said before reaching up to ruffle his son's head, making him giggle and then, once again, lifting the finger to remind him of the silence-rule.

He quietly opened up the door of the bedroom and stepped in with Alex, closing it behind him. When they approached the bassinet, Sirius immediately saw his son's grey eyes looking down at that oddly perfect little creature sleeping in it – Mary hadn't moved an inch since he'd last seen her – hopefully, he thought, she'd keep on sleeping like a rock for the rest of her baby-hood.

"Tiny," he heard Alex whispering to him like it was a big secret, though he didn't seem very impressed. She looked sort of boring in the little boy's book, clearly too small to be fun, while a little part of him did feel curious about her. Holding his beloved stuffed dog with his left hand, Alex outstretched his right arm towards the baby, though he was certainly too far away to reach her.

With a sigh, Sirius convinced himself one little touch wouldn't wake Mary up. "Careful, mate," Sirius warned his son. "Mary will be upset if she wakes up." He leaned further closely to the baby and kept one of his hands holding Alex's outstretched arm, not trusting that he'd be able to judge the amount of strength that 'careful' involved.

It lasted only a moment but it was enough to have Sirius grinning for the rest of the day: his son brushed his little hand against the baby girl's cheek, making her twitch in her sleep but not wake up, and his lips formed an 'o' of surprise, which later shifted to a smile of approval.

"So, what do you think, Alex?" Sirius asked him after they exited the room.

"Baby soft. Smaw," the little boy replied in all seriousness a toddler could have.

His father chuckled. "I'll take that to mean 'I like her'," he decided, walking down the stairs, directed to the kitchen. "And since you like her and she's your baby sister, Alex, you're supposed to protect her from all the wankers that will be following her around in about a decade and a half when she turns out as pretty as your Mom."

"Wanka?" Alex asked in confusion.

Sirius stopped walking, narrowing his eyes. He was trying not to use bad language, he really was, but sometimes he didn't even notice the words leaving his mouth. "Honestly, kid, you're killing me. Why is it that you _always_ pick up the bad words?"

Alex laughed like that was really funny.

He cleared his throat and resumed walking, hoping that if he kept talking, the kid would just forget it. "Anyway, when you're old enough, Daddy will teach you wicked hexes to keep the…" What suitable name should he call them? "…badly-intended young men miles away from her. Bet Harry would help us if we asked him."

"Merlin, he _does _start corrupting the kid awfully early in the morning," Tonks's familiar voice sounded from the ground floor hallway, to his surprise, just as he was about to reach the last flight of stairs. The surprise faded moment later as he faintly recalled earlier sending them, as well as Lulu and Gabe, an owl telling them the baby had been born.

"Well, it's Sirius, Dora. What do you expect?" Remus was asking as his best friend reached them, glaring, at the same time Kreacher disappeared with a 'pop' to the kitchen. "We hear congratulations are in order."

"Double that because it's a _girl_," Tonks said in triumph, smirking at her boyfriend. "Which reminds me that you owe me… _something_ from that wager we made a few months ago. You can pay me back at home." That last part had Remus looking away in embarrassment.

Sirius's earlier glare shifted into a smile and he chuckled. "Do I want to know what you guys bet?"

"Probably," she said, winking. "But I don't think Remus here wants me to share that piece of information." Her hair was blonde that day, with pink, purple and blue highlights on it and her colourful look seemed to reflect her very colourful mood. "We came as soon as we found your owl. How does she look like? Mary's her name, isn't it? At least she won't have to spend her whole life hating you for it."

"She looks beautiful," Sirius said, proudly, ignoring her last sentence. "Like a little cute doll."

"And she clearly already has you wrapped around her little finger at less than half a day old," Remus added.

His friend sighed. "I know… But don't worry, mate, give her a few more hours and she'll have you two wrapped it as well. After all, one's got to know how to skim their godparents for all the spoiling they can get…"

Tonks looked confused. "Her godpa…" Then, realization covered her face and she smiled. "Remus and I? Really? I mean… I've got a goddaughter?"

"Assuming you accept the position, yes, you do," Sirius confirmed, glad to see the delight all over his friend's face. Remus, he noted, also seemed pleased from seeing Tonks that happy.

"But Mia's friend. Elizabeth…"

"… was already honoured by having her last name as Mary's middle name. Will accept it or not, woman?"

Suddenly, without a warning, the metamorpagus walked up to him and wrapped her cousin and the toddler he happened to be holding in a tight hug. "Thank you! Just… thank you, Sirius!"

"Don't thank me. This only means you'll have extra babysitting duties," Sirius joked as she pulled away.

She grinned in return. "I'll take it gladly. Honestly, Sirius, this means a lot to me – I never had a goddaughter before!" Still delighted and feeling like she was about to start sounding mental, she picked up Alex from Sirius's arms – talking to a toddler would give her a good excuse to sound mental. "Hello, handsome," she greeted the little boy before he started blabbing happily as she began pacing around with him.

As Tonks entertained Alex, Sirius turned to his old friend with a smirk. "You realize that having two of my children as godkids gives you the duty of giving me at least one at some point," he said in a tone so low only Remus could hear. "I don't care if it's your first, second or eleventh child, but you, Moony, owe me and Mia a godchild. By the way, if I could pick the mother," he pointed at Tonks, "I'd pick that one."

Remus rolled his eyes. "You were planning to use that argument for a while, weren't you?"

"Clearly," he confirmed, patting his friend's shoulder. "I had this other thing about morally wanting all my children's godparents to be married to each other but then I remembered you are also Alex's godfather with Elizabeth and, well, as polygamy is sort of illegal…"

"Well, how very thoughtful of you to take that under consideration."

"Oh, yes, I'm widely known for my thoughtfulness. So… have you asked her yet? New year's is always a good occasion."

"No, not yet."

"Why not?"

"Because… just because. Now shut up," Remus told him just as Tonks was re-joining them, now with Alex on the floor, holding her hand as he toddled his way to them.

"So, when do we get to see that baby, anyway?" she asked eagerly. "Alex here says Mary is 'tiny and soft'. And speaking of what he said, he also muttered a word that sounded awfully like wan…"

"No, don't say it out loud! I'm hoping he'll forget that one before Mia hears it," Sirius told her quickly before clearing his throat and changing the subject as Remus gave him a confused look. "Anyway, Mia and the baby are still asleep right now but I don't think it will be long before they're awake. Newborns get hungry often," Sirius explained. "But anyway, come along – Alex and I were heading for breakfast now. I'm sure Kreacher will manage to get you some bacon as well while we wait."

"We've already had breakfast before we came here," Remus pointed out.

"Yes, and it was awful because I was the one cooking it," Tonks said, rolling her eyes. "I'm a train-wreck in the kitchen – salted the eggs three times and then burned them because I got distracted, as if they weren't bad enough already." She looked up at Remus. "What on earth were you thinking to even let me try cooking? I could have set the flat on fire!"

"First, because I have faith one day you'll be able to cook slightly decently, second because you're an auror and I'm sure you know how to put out a fire if it was necessary," he replied, diplomatically.

She snorted. "Maybe you're right about the second part but I'd lose my hopes on the first one if I were you, Remus." She reached down, picking Alex up from the floor. "When you're done gossiping like old ladies or whatever it is you grown up males usually talk about, please join me down at the kitchen." And with that, she headed down the stairs, enjoying another silly chat with Alex.

"You know, crappy cook or not, you'll be an idiot if you don't ever ask her to marry you," Sirius pointed out.

"Padfoot…"

He rose up his arms in defeat. "Just saying, mate. But you still owe me a godchild."

And, grinning, he went down the stairs after Tonks while his friend remained behind, huffing. He really needed to ask her.

* * *

It was past lunch-time when Izzy and Harry made it back home from the Burrow, flooing into Grimmauld Place's empty kitchen, battered, exhausted and amused to the bone.

The re-match of the snowball fight had been even more vicious than the first, involving chases across the Weasley's yard (which had resulted in Izzy falling face-first on the snow once, sending everyone in a fit of laughter), fake kidnappings followed by fake ransoms or rescue missions and massive snow forts. It occurred to them that maybe they were dramatizing the whole snow war a little _too_ much mostly because, once again, Mrs. Weasley had stopped them before they were able to finish and declare a winner.

"Thank Merlin it doesn't snow every day of the year," Harry said, roaming near the kitchen counter, trying to get his hands on one of those cookies Kreacher always kept around for Alex. "We'd get ourselves killed in a couple of months if the snowball fights kept happening." And yet, he wished they did. It was unreal how he could just forget everything bad when he was having that much fun with his friends. "So… wanna go back there later and convince the others to do it again tomorrow?"

"What, for you and Ginny to get yourselves snogging behind the snow fort instead of having my back when I was trying to help Ron escape? I'll have a snowball-shaped bruise on my back because of it – Charlie's a bloody brute."

"We've already said we were sorry…" though they hadn't meant it in the slightest. "You were supposed to give us a signal."

"I gave you a signal! What do you think the waving was about? Physical exercise?" she replied just as steps sounded down the stairs and Sirius showed up by the door.

"Ah, there you are. I thought I'd heard noises down here," he said, raising an eyebrow at them. "What are you fighting about?"

"Snowball war," Harry said.

"Oh, who won this time?"

"Nobody," Izzy said. "Mrs. Weasley hauled us all in to peel potatoes for lunch before we had a chance to finish."

"But I'm pretty sure our team was farther ahead," Harry pointed out.

Sirius snorted. "Well, there's always next winter, kids."

Izzy chuckled. "Fred and George are planning to make a tradition out of this snowball fight thing – say they can't wait until we're all allowed to use magic outside of school."

"I bet Molly will _love_ it," he observed sarcastically.

"They'll never hear the end of it. Anyway, where's Mom?"

"Upstairs in the room," he informed her. "Actually, now that you mention her, we've been waiting for you two to arrive so we could give you your… New Year's gift."

Harry furrowed his brows. "Now we get presents in New Year's as well as Christmas? That's a new one."

His godfather snorted. "Let's just say we weren't really sure of when it would arrive, so you can consider it a late Christmas present. Not to mention that you two will have to share it with the rest of us at home." With an interior snicker, Sirius made a wager against himself, trying to guess whether they'd figure out he was talking about the baby in the next couple of minutes or if he'd get a chance to lead them on a little longer.

"What is it, Dad?" Izzy asked.

"You'll just have to wait and see, Izzybel. But first, I need to enlighten you about the responsibilities that come along with this… little – and I literally mean little – present: whenever you're around it, you'll be in charge of playing with it when it gets big enough to enjoy it, helping when it gets noisy and, well, cleaning its messes. In fact, that last part will be yours exclusive."

His daughter's eyes opened wide and, for a moment, he thought she'd figured it out. _In less than one minute, _he thought proudly. His daughter was a smarty-pants. "Daddy…" she started, "did you… did you get us a _dog_?"

Or maybe not… Apparently, the game was still on. "Love, there's only a place for one dog in this house and that dog happens to be me."

"An animagus doesn't count," Harry stated.

"I say it does, kid. Besides," he said, planning to be blunt. "It would be a handful taking care of a dog with the new baby coming." Now, he was just daring them to put the pieces together.

There was a silent pause, during which both Izzy and Harry looked thoughtful. "A cat, then? They're a lot more independent," Harry inquired tentatively.

He rolled his eyes. "What would we want a cat for? We're dog people at this house."

"Then what?" his godson asked, intrigued. "It sure sounds like a living thing. Maybe a hamster?"

"I don't think hamsters are noisy," Izzy pointed out. "Let's see: it's little, it will like to play at some point and it's messy and noisy."

Harry chuckled. "Kind of sounds like Alex when he was a ba… _oh_. The baby."

"Finally! You were starting to get me worried, you know?" he told them

Izzy's face was like Christmas had just happened all over again. "Mom really had the baby? When? Is it a boy or a girl?"

"Yes, she had a baby. It happened last night and as for the gender… well, it's actually a boy but we named him Mary and plan to raise him as a girl, since you wanted a baby sister so much, Izzybel."

"I know you're lying, Daddy," she said, her voice taking a warning tone.

He gave her a mock-hurt look. "I am not. Not completely, at least. I assure you the baby's name is Mary and that we intend to raise her as a girl, Izzybel."

Her lips curled widely. "So it _is_ a girl." She turned to Harry and gave him a 'S_uck it! I was right!_' look, settling their constant gender discussion for good before turning back to her father. "Can we go see her now? Please?"

"Sure. Just don't make too much noise – Alex is having his nap." And while he'd barely just finished the last word, she was already making her way upstairs, leaving him and Harry behind, staring.

"They just go mental when there are babies around, don't they?" his godson muttered, thoughtfully. "Girls, I mean."

Sirius nodded. "Usually, yeah." But then again, so did he…

By the time they reached the room, Izzy was already sitting on the edge of her parent's bed, cooing the baby on her mother's arms as little Alex slept, obliviously cuddled against Mia's side. Harry approached to take a look at the little girl too, who stared back at him and Izzy, probably trying to figure out who the heck they were.

The matter was settled less than a minute later when little Mary let out a yawn and closed her eyes, drifting off to sleep easily as she gripped the index finger Harry had offered her to hold.

"She's so cute, Mom," Izzy was saying.

Sirius chuckled. "Let's see how cute you find her when you and Harry are changing her nappies, Izzybel."

Both teenagers turned their faces to him in a flash.

"Changing her nappies?" Harry asked in alarm, carefully removing his finger from his baby sister's grasp.

"What, you thought I was kidding earlier when I said you two were supposed to always clean her messes whenever you were around?"

Mia quickly joined into the joke. "Sweeties, you got off the hook last time with Alex because, well, there was the triwizard tournament and the school was a mess. A little diaper changing doesn't kill anyone."

"But… but I…" Harry tried to find an excuse. Yes, Mary seemed like a sweet baby and he already had a soft spot for her but changing her nappies… no, that was just weird. He needed an excuse to pass that. "I've got NEWTs next year. I need to study… a lot if I ever want to be an Auror. Just ask Hermione – she says it's vital I start doing it right now. I guess that leaves me no time for changing nappies."

"And I've got OWLs _this year_," she said, mentally thanking Harry for that save. "In less than six months, actually. It's not that I don't want to…"

"I'm sure you'll be able to fit it in your busy schedules if you, for example, take turns at it," Mia suggested, turning to Sirius, who seemed to be fighting hard not to burst into laughter as he leaned against the doorway. If she'd had any doubt before he was joking, now it was gone. "Don't you think I'm right, Sirius?"

"Absolutely," he managed to agree.

Suddenly, Harry stood up from where he's been sitting on the bed. "I should go floo the Weasleys and tell them about the baby. You know, before I… go study."

Izzy nodded and stood up as well. "I'll help you with that." And, like a flash, the two of them disappeared from the room.

"We'll call you over when she needs a change!" Sirius shouted into the corridor as they seemingly ran for their lives and then, finally, allowed himself to snort, though he was careful not to do it too loud and wake the children. "Hum, isn't it amazing how fast they run when faced with nappies?"

"That was a good one," Mia offered with a smile as she supported the sleeping Mary in one arm in order to pull the covers further onto Alex. "When are you going to tell them you were kidding?"

He shrugged. "I'll let them stew for a while. Who knows, maybe they'll end up actually doing it."

"Who knows," Mia mumbled, looking down at her daughter. "She'll be down for a few hours. Can you put her in the…?"

Even before she was done asking that question, Sirius was already taking the sleeping little girl from her arms, taking a few moments just to look at her before he kissed her brow and placed her down in her bassinet. "Seems like all she does is sleep, hum?"

His wife smiled. "Well, she needs to, doesn't she? So she can grow up to be a beautiful girl."

"She already is a beautiful girl," he pointed out, sitting on the edge of the bed, by her side and reaching to kiss her lips. "And so is her Mommy. I kind of love you, you know?"

"I kind of do," she replied with a smile before peaking over the bassinet to check on Mary and then looking down at the still napping Alex. "We make beautiful babies – I guess marrying you wasn't such a bad idea, after all."

"We'll just have to keep on making pretty babies, then," he told her, chuckling before she frowned. "Too soon?"

"I'll personally hex your bits if you dare impregnating me again anytime during the next year." She paused. "Actually, make that _two_ years."

"You wouldn't."

"Try me," she dared him, leaning against the pillows, a defying smile that she'd clearly picked up from him playing on her lips as she rubbed Alex's hair. "Still love me?"

He shrugged, trying to sound casual. "I suppose I do. It's a chronic sickness, really. I'll just have to live with it." He reached for her hand and lifted it to her lips, kissing it. "But then again, there are much worse things to live with."

**A/N: Well, not much to say. It was a mad week about to get even worse and I've got two ora presentations tomorrow, one of which to be made in french, which I honestly am not any good at... Hope you at least liked the chapter. Feedback is more than welcome! Review!**


	13. Banquet

**5 January 1997**

The welcome-back-to-school-after-the-holidays banquet at Hogwarts had turned out to be the perfect excuse for Mia to shoo Sirius out of the house.

It wasn't that she'd gotten sick of having her husband around all the time already – it was just that, since Dumbledore had given him a couple of weeks off to take care of the baby, she wanted to make sure Sirius knew that Alex and the baby didn't specifically need him at home _all the time_ to be well-taken care of. If everything went right, he'd know it was okay to go out every now and then and wouldn't spend those two weeks driving her mad with fussing and pampering to the point of her wanting to use those residual hormones of hers to kick his arse. Badly.

Shooing Sirius out of the house for that day had just been for the better good, she concluded as she lounged on her living room's sofa with her eyes closed, Mary resting in her portable cradle by her mother's side. Only there was a problem: she felt bored without him around.

The soft knock on the door had her snapping her eyes open and turn to face the door only to spot her father standing there. _Someone to talk to – thank Merlin!_ "Gabe, come on in," she invited him with a smile, sitting up. "Lulu didn't mention you were dropping by."

"I didn't think I'd have time – Order business," he explained shortly, stepping into the room. These days, he was one of the few Order members that worked full-time for it.

Mia gave him a worried look as he approached the sitting area. "Something bad?"

"Not particularly. Mad-Eye wanted us to go raid a location where we'd been told a couple of escaped Death Eaters had been spotted in – turned out to be a fake lead, after all, and we wasted a whole day preparing the raid for nothing. Don't worry, Mia," Gabriel said, sitting down on an armchair right by the side of the portable bassinet where his little granddaughter slept. "I'd say you have better things to occupy your mind," he pointed out, smiling as he saw the little girl.

She smiled. "I suppose I do," she said in a happy whisper.

"So, where's everyone else?" he asked.

"I'll assume that by everyone you mean Sirius, Lulu and Alex, since Harry and Izzy are currently on the train headed to Hogwarts."

"You assume correctly."

"Well, Sirius is at Hogwarts to attend the banquet tonight – he didn't feel like going but I made him. As for Lulu, she took Alex out to the playground for a while – he was a little jumpy today – most have something to do with those cookies that Kreacher keeps handing him."

"And how's he dealing with the new little sister?"

Mia chuckled. "He adores her. Especially after finding out the amount of racket she can cause, which apparently fascinates him. Yesterday he spent a full hour just watching her with his friend, Darcy – she came here for a little play date. One of them would come call us every time Mary moved an inch. I have a feeling he'll get over this adoration by the time she starts stealing his toys, though. I remember it happened just that way with Harry and Izzy."

"They're kids. I remember my older brother and I were in and out of each other's graces more often than one could possibly register," Gabriel agreed with a sad smile – it was still difficult thinking of his family gone, so he tried to skip the subjects. "Hum, so now you'll spend a few months on maternity leave…"

"Yes, until Easter Break," she confirmed. "Speaking of which, you and Moody were the ones who ran a background check on my substitute for Dumbledore, weren't you? Samantha Lawrence from the British Society for the History of Magic?"

Gabriel nodded. "Nothing bad about her popped out, don't worry. She's replaced you before, when you had Alex, hasn't she?"

Mia nodded. "Yes but back when she first replaced me, there wasn't a war going on. One can never be too careful these days…"

Gabriel nodded, knowingly. "That's a fact – like moody tends to say, constant vigilance is essential. Anyway, as I said, she came completely clea…"

His sentence was interrupted by a tiny, moody wail coming from the cradle where Mary called for their attention, waving her little arms angrily on the air.

"She can't be hungry already – I fed her half an hour ago," Mia mumbled, leaning to check on her fussy daughter. "Just want a little spoiling, don't you, sweetie?"

"Do you mind if I…?" Gabriel said, reaching for the bassinet, making a motion that told Mia he was intending to pick the baby up.

Mia smiled and nodded. "Go ahead," she said, leaning back against the sofa, trusting her father would have it under control.

As she watched, Gabriel reached to get a hold of his granddaughter, stiffly at first. It wasn't the first time he held her but he certainly recalled her being much stiller last time he'd done it. She'd grow up to become a little spitfire, he concluded. After a few seconds of awkward rocking, Mary's fussing seemed to show signs of calming down as she suddenly became very interested in staring up at him instead. It was amazing, he noted, how many she memories she brought back.

"She likes you," Mia told him with a smile. "Just hold her for a little while and hopefully she'll be out like a light soon."

Gabe nodded and looked up at his daughter. "You look tired," he noted.

She shrugged. "It's nothing – I'm still getting used to her schedule. She's worth the trouble, believe me."

Her father smiled. "She's going to look a lot like you, you know?" he pointed out, glancing down at Mary. "Mark my words, she will."

"How is it that you can tell that already?" Mia asked, raising an eyebrow. "She's still a shrivelled little thing."

"She may be but she looks almost exactly the way you did when you were born. Your eyes, for instance, were exactly the same shade of dark blue as hers are now – I'd bet anything they're going to turn brown like yours did. You also had this peach-fuzz hair – very light brown, almost blond, like Mary's here. Lucy was convinced you'd get blonde hair like mine but turns out she was wrong – it got dark like hers and so will this little one's." When he looked up Mia, he noted she was staring at him with a look of half-surprise, half-delight. "What?"

"You remember what shade of blue my eyes were when I was born? And exactly how my hair looked like?" she asked in a very low tone. Lulu had told her they'd been allowed to keep her for themselves for a single night before giving her up. And from that night, he could remember such small details as what shade her eyes and had hair had been… "I never thought you could have… absorbed so much in a single night."

"You can memorize a lot of things when you think that may be the only chance you've got to do it," he told her simply as Mary's eyes slowly dropped as he held her. He'd loved his daughter enough for a whole lifetime that night and then gotten the chance to do it all over again.

"Thank you… I guess," she replied, not sure of what was the right thing to say right then – it touched her more deeply that she could explain. "It means a lot that you'd remember those things."

"You don't have to thank me for that, Mia," he pointed out. "I _needed_ to remember those things."

She smiled at his words. "How about you and Lulu stay for dinner tonight, since Sirius is out? It's time I spent some quality time alone with my parents… and, well, a toddler and a newborn too, if you don't mind. What do you say to that?"

He smiled. "I say it seems like a very good idea."

* * *

Spending a couple of hours in the empty Hogwarts staffroom, which he very rarely frequented for some reason, until it was time for him to attend the banquet had seemed like a pretty decent idea by the time Sirius had arrived to the school, rather annoyed from having been shooed away from his home by Mia. Of course, if he'd known who'd join him there later, he probably would have picked some other place to go read the Daily Prophet.

"Well, well, look who's decided disgrace us with a visit," a slow voice – one of the most annoying sounds on Earth, in Sirius's book – spoke. "And here I thought, when the headmaster mentioned he'd given you, Black, two weeks of leave, that this school would be shielded from your unwelcome presence for at least that time."

Sirius didn't even need to look up to know it was Snape. He simple kept on reading – or pretending he was, since the newspaper article on the finances of the ministry didn't interest him whatsoever –, not bothering to remove his feet from the table he'd propelled them onto. "I knew there was a reason why I don't come to the staffroom very often," he said, casually. "As reckless as people deem me for, I don't like risking running into sources of greasy hair – who knows, it might be contagious and I'd end up afflicted for life."

"Your sense of humour is just astounding, Black. Makes me wonder how your wife can spend long enough without laughing to conceive yet another Black, let alone give birth to one," Snape said, making his way around the table Sirius was sitting at in order to reach a counter at the opposite side of the room and serve himself with a cup of tea.

Sirius smiled at the opportunity he's just been given. "You see, Snape, I'm not sure how acquainted you are with that… lovely act that leads to the conceiving but I can assure you that, speaking in theory since it never happened to me personally, laughter wouldn't really get in the way of the mechanics of it. I'm sure a lot of books in the restricted section of the library can confirm that…"

"I see your lack of shame is just as astounding," Snape told him flatly. "What, I wonder, possessed the headmaster to even let you and your questionable… morals near the students?"

"Ooch, that one hurt," he replied sarcastically in an exaggeratedly fake tone. "I'd say it was the that possessed him not to have sacked you already for bullying your students in a regular basis, but since I have no idea what it is, I'll just let you wonder… Go wash your hair with Hippogriff shampoo in the meanwhile, would you? I heard it keeps the flies away."

"I heard the same thing about Dementors keeping criminals away from the general population but it seems to be wrong."

Sirius glared over the newspaper – if he didn't know how Shape's mind worked, he might have let that one pass as a reference to the previous year's massive breakout from Azkaban. "You know, denial doesn't change the fact that, for your disappointment, I was proven innocent. It also won't change the fact that you have the one-year curse that troubles the DADA teacher's position hovering over your head. The odds are not on your favour: one dead, other with permanent brain damage, another kissed by a Dementor and two sacked… the precedents don't look good at all, Snape."

"I suppose that has you rather excited, doesn't it?"

"Very," he confessed. "I'm cheering for the sacking, honestly – I'm good enough not to wish you dead or a vegetable."

Snape narrowed his eyes. "Really? I wouldn't know. Your actions a couple of decades ago didn't show that at all."

Sirius felt the muscles on his neck tensing, folding the newspaper and putting it down. "Oh, you really want to go there? Because all I wanted at fifteen years-old was to have someone's blood in my hands, especially yours," he said, his tone simmering in sarcasm as he slowly stood up, towering a few inches over Snape. "James saved your life that night – least you could do was not treating his son like he's the devil himself and not giving him detention for so much as breathing…"

"That boy thinks that because he'd famous, he can rule this school and get everyone to do as he wishes…"

Aiming for his godson seemed to hit a nerve. "That's crap and you know it! How many times have you heard him announcing his name out loud to open way through a crowded corridor?"

"… he's a disrespectful, attention-seeking, conceited troublemaker. _Just_ like his father…"

"Oh, shove it up your arse, would you, Snivellus?" Sirius shouted, angry enough to reach for the wand on his pocket.

"_What is the meaning of this?_" McGonagall's raised voice came from the doorway before he could get the wand out.

It was only when he turned to the door that Sirius noticed the small group of students – not quite half a dozen of first and second years – witnessing his and Snape's… altercation. Behind them, the deputy-headmistress, hands on her hips as she gripped a roll of parchment, glared at them with blazes on her eyes.

"To the Great Hall, children," she ordered the students in a tone firm enough to have them speeding away immediately. Then, very slowly, in a way that only engorged the tension in the room, McGonagall stepped into the room, closing and locking the door with a silent wave of her wand, likely casting imperturbable charms on it as well. When she spoke, her voice came out furious and heavy. "Never in my teaching life… brawling! Two _teachers_! Like _hormonal teenage boys_… Just childish! Unbelievable!" The fact that it sounded quite incoherent only made them realized just how pissed off she was. McGonagall _never_ sounded incoherent.

Sirius couldn't even bring himself to use her first name as he usually did these days – he _felt_ like a teenage boy again, being scolded for getting in trouble. "Professor, I…"

"Quiet, Black!" she ordered, turning to Snape almost immediately. "You too! I don't want to know _why_ this pitiful scene was taking place; I don't want to know who started it! You are _teachers_ for Merlin's sake. What example are you giving to your students with that childish shouting match? It's unbelievable."

Snape tried to speak. "I'd just like to point out…"

"I said _quiet_, Severus! I don't want to hear anything," she pointed her wand at the door, opening it. "You are needed down at the Great Hall to keep an eye on the children. As for you," she continued, turning to face Sirius (as Snape left the room with a not-so-happy look on his face) and handing him the roll of parchment she was carrying, "that's the list of the students that are returning to the school on the train. Go down to the gates and check the names of every student that arrives."

"But isn't Hagrid the one who usually does that?"

The older teacher narrowed her eyes dangerously. "Do I need to spell it as a detention the way I used to do when you were sixteen, Sirius?"

"What… I'm in…" He gulped. "I'm going right now."

"Hurry up! The train is about to arrive," she called after him as he sped away, feeling the hair on the back of his neck standing up.

Merlin, if he'd ever had a flash back to his teenage years, that was it. Even decades after he'd graduated, McGonagall could still give him the chills. There he was, a married man, father four – _Four? When did that happen? _– and a _teacher_, doing the walk of shame towards yet another detention. And why was it that he had to stand outside while authentic buckets of snow fell from the sky while Snape got to serve his punishment under the warmth of the Great Hall?

He huffed as he dressed his cloak before walking out of the castle's doors and stepping out into the freezing grounds. Maybe he should have just ignored Mia's insistence and remained home. He'd probably be tickling Alex mercilessly by then or cuddling his little Mary by the fire…

Hagrid was easy to spot by the gates, standing in his winter tent-like fur cloak with the old, lazy dog, Fang, peaking his saggy head from under his owner's cloak, covering the rest of his body from the snow. "Evenin', Sirius," the gamekeeper greeted as he reached him. "What are yeh doin' down here? Waitin' fer the kids?"

"_Professor_ Black got himself grounded by old McGonagall for brawling with Snape," Filch, who seemingly hadn't been too far behind Sirius on the way there, announced with a sadistic snicker before he could even greet the half-giant. t. "She had me coming here to make sure he does his job checking the kids into the school."

If there had been any hope of convincing Hagrid to let him off the hook, the hateful caretaker had just crushed it like a bug. "Hope you freeze solid down here," Sirius told the caretaker through his teeth as the man smiled, showing his half-black teeth.

McGonagall had been right in saying he should hurry. A group of students was already climbing out of one of the Thestral-ridden carriages and approached the gates in a hurry. Thankfully, he thought, there weren't as many kids arriving then as there had been in the first of September – many had already been brought via apparition by their parents and others had simply not left the school for the holidays.

Eight or nine carriages later, he finally spotted Izzy and Harry climbing out of one, followed by Ginny, Hermione, Neville and Luna. "What are you doing down here?" Harry asked him as he approached with a curious look on his face.

Sirius half groaned in annoyance, using his quill to tick his godson's name off the list, followed by his daughter and the rest of their friends, with the half-frozen quill he'd been given. "Checking everyone in, as you can see," he said in a flat tone.

Ginny gave him a confused look. "Why? Isn't it usually Hagrid who does it? Or Filch?"

Sirius shrugged, trying to escape the subject. "Filch is obviously happy enough with annoying everyone by rummaging through their things, trying to find anything either illegal or from the twin's shop." He rolled his eyes. "As if they didn't find fool-proof ways of masking their products." Sirius looked up, trying to spot the students coming after them. "Isn't Ron with you?"

Hermione's reaction, which involved a frown and an annoyed sniff reminded him that she and Ron weren't in speaking to each other and Harry now had to split himself between the two. He guessed now would be Hermione's turn to have Harry's company at the moment.

"Hiding behind a tree with Lavender, for all we know," the prefect girl said flatly.

"Er… right," he mumbled uncomfortably.

"But you still haven't told us why you're standing here at the gates, checking in students," Izzy pointed out, more interested in the potential story behind it – she knew her father enough to be sure that he wouldn't volunteer for a monotonous task such as ticking names from a list.

Sirius gave his daughter a quick – yet not quite meant – glare, wishing she hadn't brought it up again. Yet, it didn't take him long to give in. "I may or may not have had a semi-public altercation with Snape in front of a few students who stayed behind for the holidays and it may or may not have irritated McGonagall to the point of her sending me down here and making me check the students in."

"McGonagall grounded you?" Ginny asked in an amused tone.

Sirius gave her an offended look. "What am I? An eight-year-old kid? She just wanted me to cool-off a little, which is quite literally working in this forsaken weather…"

"A time out it is, then," Izzy concluded with a chuckle.

He directed another glare to Izzy. "Do I have to remind you that I have the power to ground you both at home and at school?"

She chuckled. "You never ground anyone, Daddy. The troublemaker in you doesn't believe in that sort of thing."

"Maybe I'll give it a try just for hell of it, Izzybel," he said, making her shake her head doubtfully.

"Did you at least get to curse Snape?" Neville asked.

"Neville!" Hermione scolded. "Snape's a teacher."

Ginny was the one to respond. "He calls you an insufferable know-it-all. He'd have it coming!"

"He says I'm a delusional airhead," Luna pointed out dreamily. "I think he was attacked by Nargles when he was very young – that might cause the bitterness."

"I'm fairly sure he was born that way, Luna. Unfortunately, though, I didn't get the chance to whip my wand out at all," Sirius pointed out. "Now, you kids go inside – I'll tell you the rest of the story in another time."

"Actually," Harry, who'd been very silent ever since Sirius had mentioned Snape, said. "Can you take a break? There's something I should probably tell you…"

Sirius raised an eyebrow but, seeing from Harry's face that it was serious, signalled at Hagrid to take over his place for a few minutes, ignoring Filch's protests. While the other kids made their way up to the castle, Ginny stayed behind, chatting with Hagrid by the gates as she waited for Harry.

"So?" Sirius asked his godson.

The young boy gulped in hesitation. "During the Christmas Party… the one that Slughorn organized… I heard Snape and Malfoy talking. About Voldemort."

"About Vol… wait, but that party was back in December! Why didn't you say something before?"

"I didn't want to ruin Christmas…" the young boy explained. "I was planning to say it right after New Year's but then Mary was born and it just slipped my mind…"

Sirius sighed. "You could have said something anyway… what did you hear, then?"

"Well, Malfoy's definitely a Death Eater… he has some sort of mission for Voldemort and Snape… he says he made an unbreakable vow to help him with it!"

His eyes narrowed. "An unbreakable vow…" He pursed his lips. _That son of a bitch_. "He's been playing us all along…."

"Hermione says he might be bluffing in order to find out whatever Malfoy was planning but still…"

"He _could _be bluffing," Sirius noted flatly, clearly not buying it. "But why is it that I find it so much easier to believe that bastard has been selling us to You-Know-Who? When I get my hands…"

"No! You can't!" Harry said, alarmed. "You can't say anything to him – not before talking to the order! He could try something or if you jumped on him and he was really bluffing, it might get you into trouble, Sirius…"

He had to admit the kid had a point. It would take all the strength he had to face Snape and not ram his fist through his face but he'd have to make an effort. "Fine," Sirius said, looking down at his godson. "But if you find anything else, Harry – _anything _– you tell me right away okay. Never mind if it is a public holiday of someone's birthday – just tell me, okay?"

Harry nodded. "I'm sorry I only told you now, I just…"

Sirius shook his head. "Never mind, kid. But, remember, next time…"

"I'll run to tell you," Harry promised.

"Good. Now go get your girl and head to the banquet. I'll be there when I'm done here," Sirius told him, receiving a nod in return before Harry started walking towards Ginny and they headed to the castle together.

Then, for the first time that day, Sirius felt thankful to McGonagall for his 'detention' – a little time outside doing a boring task would give him the chance to cool off. And deep down he hoped, just hoped, that Snape was bluffing or else the order would have been fooled by a spy again.

* * *

Later, when he stepped into his room at Grimmauld Place, he found his wife already lying down, the baby sleeping peacefully across her chest as Mia rubbed her little back. She smiled up at him as he dragged himself in and circled the bed silently to let himself fall down on the bed by her side, groaning with his eyes closed.

Very softly, he felt her hand caressing his face before moving up to rub his dark, rather messy, hair. "How was your evening?" she asked him softly.

He opened his eyes and sighed as he felt her soothing touch. "Well, I went to the banquet the way you wanted me to, got in a fight with Snape, was grounded by McGonagall for it, then was mocked at by the kids for being grounded and, finally, was told by Harry that he has reasons to believe Snape literally is a traitorous bastard… I'll develop that part in the morning if you don't mind. All in all, same old thing." He let out a breath and reached to touch Mary's tiny fist, which gripped his index finger even in her sleep. "What about you? How was your evening?"

"Are you asking me or the baby?"

He chuckled softly and shrugged. "Both."

"Well, Mary mostly napped, ate, cried and got spoiled. As for me, I watched her, got visited by Gabe, had dinner with my parents and then Lulu helped me give this little lady a bath afterwards – that is, before she threw one hell of a tantrum. Alex though that part was just hilarious, by the way, since he was watching from the sidelines."

Sirius grinned. "That's my boy," he said proudly. "A little Marauder."

"Clearly," Mia replied. "It seems both of us had interesting evenings, then. I suppose I don't need to ask what you and Snape fought about, do I?"

"He's a smarmy git and I have no patience whatsoever for him," Sirius said shortly. "Of course if I knew about the traitorous bastard part, I might have put some used to my wand… but like I said, I'm not in the mood to talk about that now. Tell me something new."

"I'm thinking of letting the O'Dells, Darcy's grandparents, keep the Wales house," Mia told him.

"Really?"

She nodded. "I spent today's dinner talking to Lulu and Gabe and felt happier spending that little time with them then I ever felt when spending time with Susan and Phillip Davis for the seventeen years I lived in that house – their house. It was beautiful but it was never mine, so it doesn't make much sense for me to keep it now after I haven't been there in years. Last time we talked, the O'Dells were thinking of moving definitely here to Britain in order to be within apparition reach of Seamus at Hogwarts, so if they want to keep that house, it's theirs. Even if they want to pay for it, I'm sure we'll reach an agreement – hopefully, they'll be happier there."

"You're getting rid of your Wales house," he repeated.

She nodded, rubbing the baby's back. "I'm getting rid of it. Do you think it's stupid?"

He shook his head. "No. I just think it is your own way of telling Susan and Phillip to shove it. Besides, I'd say three properties are more than enough for us."

She raised an eyebrow. "Three?"

He nodded. "This one, our old flat and the beach house that I'm planning to get us after the war is over so we can escape there whenever we feel like it – I even had a dream about that last one the day Mary was born."

Mia smiled. "Tell me about it."

"Well, the sun was shining and I was lying on the sand, listening to the waves crashing and the kids playing somewhere. It was kind of great. Then, you showed up, beautiful as ever, in this flowing white dress and quite literally jump me. I'd get into more detail but I'm afraid there are impressionable little ears in this room," he added, nodding at Mary.

"I hope you realize there will be no jumping for at least the next five and a half weeks," Mia pointed out with a smirk.

"I know. I've got a calendar somewhere – I charmed it so it would count the days until the time arrived…"

"How practical of you," she told him. "Though, of course, by the time the time arrives, you'll also have to hope I'm in the mood. And don't forget that little agreement about not getting me pregnant for the next three years."

"Hey, you said two before!" he protested, loud enough to have Mary shifting in her sleep.

"Well, that was before Mary threw that huge tantrum during her bath," she pointed out, shifting on the bed so she could sit up and reach to place the baby in her bassinet. "Depending on how much you, Izzy and Harry help around and on my future wishes, I may or may not be open to renegotiation."

He sniffed, shaking his head as she lay back down. "Renegotiation my arse…"

"And speaking of 'arse' and other non-adequate vocabulary for a nearly two-year-old boy, why did our son utter the word 'wanker' during dinner today?" She pinched his arm, making him let out a muffle whine.

"Ooch, that's gonna leave a mark…" he complained, rubbing his own arm. _Little traitor_, he thought. When he believed that, after four days, the kid had already forgotten the damn word. He cleared his throat, facing his wife, whose eyebrows were rising in inquisition as her eyes shot bullets of accusation. He took a moment to gulp. "I'm sure there's a perfectly valid explanation for that…"

**A/N: After a veeery long week (it felt like a month to me), you get a very long chapter. Almost didn't make it posting tonight... Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter - feedback is appreciated, as always. Review!**


	14. Commitment

**1****2 February 1997**

Looking at Diagon Alley these days nearly made Sirius feel like he was watching a ghost town compared to what he remembered of its past, he observed as he exited the Quidditch-supplies shop. Along the length of the alley, which used to be so packed that one could barely walk without being bumped or stepped into, Sirius could hardly spot more than two or three dozen of – all hurrying – folks, at least three of which with an auror vibe all over them. That, the many walled up shops and the rather shady look all around simply gave him the chills… The whispers – more like screams now – of war really were all over.

He remembered that the first time he'd been to Diagon Alley, when he was six or seven years-old, he'd found it the most fascinating place he'd ever been to. All the people, the loud voices, the movement… it was nothing like the Grimmauld Place he'd grown up in. Sirius hadn't even cared that he was being carelessly dragged around by his nutcase of a mother, so fascinated the environment of that simple – lower, as Walburga Black liked to refer – magical London location. He remembered even better the first time he'd gone there without his parents, right in that summer after he'd ran away from home and moved in with the Potters. It had been like the place had become even more magical.

Now, ironically Grimmauld Place had become his home and Diagon Alley had become a ghost of what it had once been. How much life could change over the years… how much the world itself could change and yet remain the same.

"Are you planning to stand here on the street for the rest of the day or are you counting on going home anytime before sunset, Padfoot?"

Sirius didn't even need to turn to know that the owner of the voice behind him saying those words was Remus. "Just taking a moment to think, Moony," he mumbled as his old friend joined his side, finally turning to face him. The werewolf looked in a very good mood – the sort of good mood that Sirius could barely recall ever seeing in him. "Back from your lunch break? It's a bit late, don't you think? Past four in the afternoon. I'll be shocked if you tell me you're slacking on your job."

Remus rolled his eyes. "It's the opposite, actually. I got caught up with the work at the shop and ended up eating late – Valentine's day is coming up and everyone seems to think joke products are the perfect gifts, imagine that. Plenty of accounting to make, plenty of shelves to re-stock. And I'm getting the twins' lunch as well," he added, nodding at the large bag he was carrying. "They're even worse than I am. I swear if I didn't remind them of meal times or bring those to them, those two would forget to eat more times than not, so entranced they are with that shop and their experiments."

"Acting as their nanny as well as their shop-manager, aren't you, Moony?" Sirius joked.

"I'm starting to believe I am – I wonder how long they are going to leave with the amount of trouble they cause. This morning when I arrived, they were putting out a fire they'd caused when developing their 'indoors non-damaging fireworks'," Remus informed him dryly.

Sirius snorted. "Well, I see that's not going so well," he stated the obvious.

"Clearly," Remus repeated. "And what are _you_ doing here on Diagon Alley, alone, right in the middle of the afternoon? Don't tell me you're hiding from Mia."

"Why would I want to hide from my beloved wife," he replied. "I've just left Hogwarts, actually, and came by to leave my broom here at _Quality Quidditch Supplies _for the guys to check. There was a game today – Slytherin-Hufflepuff with the little snakes catching the snitch ten minutes into the game, let me add – and the broom was a little twitchy while I was refereeing – some charm must be working wrong… or Snape has finally decided to off me by sabotaging with my broomstick. One can never know."

Remus let out a frustrated huff. "Sirius, we've talked about this…"

"Yeah, yeah, and Dumbledore says that crap with him helping Malfoy was a secret favour to him, that Snape was just trying to get information out of him and is on your side, that he is a bloody saint and should have a hospital named after him, blah, blah. I still think Snivellus is a shady, fake bastard and that one day we'll get a pretty bad surprise from his corner but that's just me, apparently… Anyway, I don't want him ruining my day, so we'd better change the subject."

Yes, that was probably for the best, Remus accepted. Insisting would only irritate him and an irritated Sirius was a reckless one. "How about we get to the shop and move this conversation altogether? It's freezing out here," he suggested

Sirius nodded. "Seems like a good idea", he agreed, following his friend to what seemed to be the most – if not the only – crowded shop in Diagon Alley. "How do you guys pull this off? Filling the store with people when the whole street is practically empty?"

"We've got a floo connection to one of the back rooms open to the public during working hours. People seem to be more comfortable with flooing directly into the shop," Remus explained as walked in the shop's direction. "Besides," he added when they reached it, "people need cheerful stuff. Outside of a joke shop, what else can they find that for sale?"

"Got a point there," Sirius admitted, stepping in and frowning at the thought that he'd have to dig his way through that forsaken mob crowding the inside or the shop. Thankfully, because he was already used to it, Remus led the way through the tight knit of people, leaving the bag containing Fred and George's lunches with the blonde girl at the counter, whose name Sirius just couldn't remember. Then, they made their way up the stairs behind the counter, which led up to the upper floor where they could find Remus's cramped office, as always with books and piles of parchment all over it.

"So, how's Mia? And the children?" Remus asked him, removing his cloak and placing it on the back of his chair before sitting down by the desk.

"They're good," Sirius said, taking a seat opposite him. Like a charm, the mention of his wife and kids put him in a high mood. "They're great, actually. Mia is her same old self – no hormonal explosions these days, thank Merlin –, Harry and Izzy are doing fine at school, Alex is running all over the place and Mary is as happy as a little baby can be."

"Keeping you and Mia awake, then?"

Sirius's grin flashed. "I forgot what a full night of sleep feels like. It's amazing. She smiled at me this morning – Mia said it was probably gas but I don't think so. She's turning six-weeks-today. Kids can smile from that age on. I read it somewhere."

"I'll take your word for it," Remus told him, rather amused. He'd never imagined back when he'd met Sirius Black in his first train ride to Hogwarts that that daring, slightly unhappy boy would grow up to become such a proud, happy dad. "Any incidents involving teaching Alex bad words lately?"

Sirius visibly gulped. "No, thank Merlin. Blimey, Mia threatened to put a censoring hex on me if Alex ever learned some sort of curse word from me again. You know what that thing does to you? It gives you a jolt every time you even think of something slightly inappropriate! I can't have that, Moony – this is me. I am _always_ thinking of something inappropriate!"

Remus raised an eyebrow. "Who told you a censoring hex worked like that?"

"Mia did," he said. "Why do you ask?" But before his friend could answer, Sirius realized the truth, immediately feeling awfully dumb. "Oh, she was lying wasn't she? She was just trying to scare me."

The werewolf nodded. "The censoring hex just silences any inappropriate word you say – there are no jolts involved, as far as I know."

He narrowed his eyes. "Damn, that was well-played. I should have known it was bogus – it sounded way too sadistic for Mia to consider."

"Rather impressive, actually," Remus stated, to his friend's annoyance. "Not everyone can fool a Marauder like that…"

"Oh, shut up," Sirius replied in a touchy tone. "_Anyway_," he said, emphasising the fact that he really wanted to change the subject, "I noticed you didn't drop by this weekend, which I found odd since Tonks always drags your sorry arse to Grimmauld Place every Sunday afternoon to spend time with your godkids…" The silly smile that covered Remus's face for a single moment had Sirius raising an eyebrow. _Interesting,_ he thought. "I'll assume it wasn't because of some auror emergency for Tonks – a more horizontal emergency, maybe…"

"We just got busy," Remus said quickly, the smile inadvertently flashing again for another moment. "We'll drop by tomorrow or something, don't worry."

Sirius narrowed his eyes at him. "For Merlin's sake, Moony, tell me that stupid grin means you asked her to marry you already," he begged his friend who, to his disappointment, shook his head in a 'no'. Faced with the denial, Sirius gave him a frustrated look. "Are you _kidding_ me? You've been carrying the bloody ring around for over two months! You know, I'm her cousin, mate. That gives me the right to hit you – and I mean hit you as in _punch_ you and not hex you – if I think you're starting to lead her on!"

A moment of silence followed that threat, during which Sirius glared at his oldest friend, trying to observe his reaction. The fact that Remus didn't look even slightly afraid was nearly offensive – hadn't he looked scary enough? Sirius asked himself. Probably not. If anything, his friend looked… amused with his reaction.

Remus cleared his throat before speaking, hoping he'd be able to hold the laughter. "You know, punching me would probably hurt _you_ more than it would hurt me – one of the very few perks of being a werewolf is the fact that I'm generally less hurt-able than most people."

Sirius shrugged. "Like I'd care – it would be worth proving the point. What the hell is wrong with you? Why won't you just ask her? I thought we'd already reached the conclusion that you're right for her."

"If you'd let me explain instead of throwing a fit, maybe you'd already know why by now," Remus replied.

"Fine, tell me then. I can't wait to hear it," Sirius told him, leaving back against the chair.

Lupin sighed before speaking. "I didn't ask Dora because… well, because she beat me to it," he finally said.

Sirius's first look was of disbelief towards his friend. Then, minutes later, the disbelief shifted into amused joy. "_She _asked you?"

"Last Friday afternoon. She knew about the ring," Remus explained. "She saw it weeks ago but decided to wait for me to ask without telling me she knew about it. Apparently, she got sick of waiting and just took matters into her own hands. It's safe to say it completely caught me by surprise."

Like a candle, Sirius's face lit up. "Go Tonks! I told you she was the perfect woman for you, didn't I? If you tell me you refused, Moony, you'll have to give me a few minutes to fetch Fred and George so they'll help me beat the crap out of you."

"I don't think you'll need to worry about that," his friend pointed out in a very low, slightly embarrassed tone.

Sirius shook his head, snorting. "Well, I'll be damned. You got engaged. _Finally_!"

"I did, yes… and that's not quite all of it…" Remus swallowed hard. "Remember the advice you gave me when I first told you about the ring?"

He shrugged. "Stop freaking out and ask her? Don't worry, mate, there's no shame in being the girl asking – it leads to the same end, doesn't it?"

"No, I'm not talking about that part. I mean what you said about afterwards, Padfoot. What I should do after the proposal…"

He scratched his chin, trying to recall it but there seemed to be a large blank spot named 'my best friend just got over the commitment issues and got engaged' over all his memories. "Sorry, mate, it's been a few months. I'm just can't rem…" But before he could finish his words, the memory came and he stared at Remus in disbelief. "You didn't."

"We did."

"You eloped?"

"We did," Remus repeated, not quite able to hide a nervous smile now.

"You got married?" Sirius asked again, disbelief still all over his voice as he slowly stood up. "As in… right exchanging, husband and wife married? Are you mocking me, Moony? April's fool day is more than a month away."

The werewolf shook his head. "I am not mocking you, Padfoot. I promise. It happened right after the proposal – it was sudden, yes, but felt right and we just… _knew_ we had to do it then or else one of us – probably me – would over-think it and ruin everything. Still feels hard to believe to me too, actually. But it's true. I am… married."

Sirius had to laugh at that. "Well, congratulations, I guess. I'll confess I didn't think you had it in you to go ahead with it but, Merlin, it feels great to be wrong," he said, circling the desk to approach his friend, who stood up too for a quick 'manly hug'. "Honestly, mate, I'm thrilled about you guys. But you could have said something sooner, you know? It's been a few days."

"We were… occupied. You're actually one of the first to know. We're only telling Ted and Andromeda tonight after work. I hope they take it well…"

"Well, they'd better, since they eloped themselves," Sirius pointed out, making his way back to his seat and sighed. "Merlin, an engagement, a wedding… What's next? Tonks is nine-months pregnant and has been hiding it with her Metamorphagus powers?"

Remus visibly paled. "No! I don't think that's even possible."

"Just saying," he replied, lifting his hands up for a moment in defeat. "By the way, I'm still your Best Man. Count on a bachelor party when you least expect it – just because you're not a bachelor anymore, that doesn't count as an excuse. I'd take care of it tonight but I've already got plans for myself and Mia." That night, he thought happily, it was the end of those six miserable weeks of abstinence after a woman had a baby. And he just couldn't wait to get his hands on Mia… He cleared his throat, hoping to clear the now-so-appropriate thoughts that were fogging his mind too. "So, why are you here working and not still enjoying your honeymoon? That's just shameful."

"I haven't told Fred and George about the wedding yet. Besides, there's a lot of work to think of now: there's Valentine's Day and then the twins are thinking of opening a new branch of the shop at Hogsmeade… Dora is also buried in work at the ministry."

"Shameful," Sirius repeated. "Well, get your arse of that chair and follow me, at least," he instructed him, getting up.

"What for?"

"We, my friend, are going to the Three Broomsticks and we're grabbing a butterbeer. It's not every day my best friend, a marauder, announces he eloped – we've got to drink to it. Besides, I believe I still have a Best man toast to improvise."

* * *

"Where's Mia?" Sirius asked his mother-in-law when he arrived at home and saw her sitting in the living room on her own reading the Quibbler, Mia nowhere to be seen. "And Alex?" he added, noting his son was missing too.

"Gabe took Alex out for a walk and Mia went out," Lulu mumbled, not looking up from the magazine. "She and Elizabeth decided to have a girl's night out tonight and are probably arriving late. Gabe and I will stay over to help you with the kids."

Shocked, Sirius opened his mouth and closed it again seconds later. "But… she… tonight? She went out _tonight_? Tonight of _all nights_?"

Lulu calmly looked up. "Is there anything special about tonight?"

"We… _well_, yes! We're finally allowed to…" He stopped, recalling he was in fact talking to his wife's mother and that mentioning shagging Mia would probably be awkward. To him, at least, since Lulu hardly found anything remotely awkward. "We had plans," he said plainly.

"Did you even tell Mia about those… plans?" she asked

"I…" No, he hadn't. But, what the hell, it wasn't a hard one to figure out, was it? "It was implied."

"On what?" Lulu asked again, feigning innocence.

"On… nothing."

"You're not making any sense at all," Lulu pointed out.

He huffed. "Oh, fine. It's been six weeks since she had the baby. That's all I'm saying."

"Ah, so your plans were to shag my daughter, then," his mother-in-law stated casually. "About that… you should probably know that Elizabeth advised her during today's appointment to extend that abstinence period for a couple more weeks. Just to be safe. That's why Mia went out with her tonight – to… avoid temptation, so to speak."

Sirius's look was of horror. "No…"

"It's just two weeks. If you managed thirteen years without her, two weeks will be nothing," Lulu pointed out with a shrug.

"But… but I…"

"Oh, she did leave you a note, by the way," Lulu said, reaching for the left pocket of her jeans and handing a folded piece of parchment to him, which he accepted with a grunt. However, as soon as he started read the short note, there was relief.

"_Waiting for you at our old flat…Bring a change of clothes and don't be late._

_Love you,_

_Mia."_

His glare was immediately directed at an amused Lulu as he looked down at her, shaking his head. "That was just cruel."

Lulu grinned in amusement. "What? Did I get the message wrong? Was it three weeks instead?"

Sirius kept on glaring. "No, I don't think you did get the wrong message. You're just a horrible, sadistic mother-in-law sometimes, you know? I wonder why I even like you at all."

"I'm very likeable – just ask Gabe. And you make it too easy for me by believing just anything."

"I do not!"

"Yes, you do. Especially when you're thinking with your lower brain, which is most of the time."

"Oh, just shut up," he said irritably, especially recalling the fact that he'd been well fooled by his own wife with the whole censoring hex thing. "You know what? Stay here mocking yourself while I'm going upstairs to get my things for tonight and check on Mary." And, just as he said that, he gave Lulu another narrow-eyed look, which had her laughing, and walked out of the room.

_I__ don't think with my… 'lower-brain' all that much, do I?_ Sirius wondered as he climbed up the stairs. He was just madly in love with his wife and couldn't get enough of her. He couldn't help it, honestly, not even when she'd so cruelly been fooling him for the past six weeks with thought of a fake hex.

Clearing his mind of those thought, he was quick enough grabbing a few of his clothes from his and Mia's room and shoving them into a bag, whose size he reduced so he could carry it in his pocket. Then, leaving the room, he stepped into the nursery and smiled when he saw his daughter awake in her bassinet.

She was punching and kicking her little arms and legs on the air and seemed to be in a verge of crying – clearly Mary wasn't too happy with being alone and awake, so throwing a temper seemed to be a fitting reaction. Hurrying, Sirius picked her up before she had a chance of starting a fit and the little girl seemed to be happy enough in her father's arms.

Sirius grinned down at her. "Hi there, baby," he greeted little Mary, who reached towards his face with her little arms and stared up with curious little eyes. "Had a good nap?" As expected, he didn't get any response from her as the baby just kept on looking up. "Not in a chatty mood, hum? Alright then. I suppose it's no use asking you for another smile, is it, little girl? Because we both know that was _not_ gas. You're probably the nicest girl to Daddy in this house."

Uninterested, Mary yawned and closed her eyes as her little hands curled into fists and she apparently went down for another nap. Typical – she might be a delightfully good baby during the day but at night… at night the beast came out, so to speak.

He kissed the baby's brow again and placed her back in her cradle, exiting the room silently so he wouldn't wake her back up. When he reached the first floor again, he poked his head back into the living room in order to talk to Lulu.

"Hey, if you need something with the kids…"

His mother-in-law shot him a 'get lost' sort of look over the magazine she'd resumed ready. "I'm sure we'll be able to handle them just fine. And, for the record, if you and Mia go obsessive on me and start flooing every half hour to check on the kids, I'm turning off the connection. I swear I am."

"We're not _that _bad," he replied. "It's just… Mary's still very little."

Lulu raised an eyebrow at him. "Did I not raise your wife, Sirius? Mary will be fine, I'll floo if, Merlin forbid, something bad happens. Now, I was under the impression you were more than eager to get your hands on Mia so," she waved her hand towards the door, "shoo."

He rolled his eyes but didn't bother insisting on the matter – if there was someone he knew he could trust his newborn baby with for a night, it was Lulu, no matter how much she could annoy him from time to time.

On his way down, Sirius was glad to run into Alex and Gabe, who were just arriving from their walk, which gave him a chance to have slightly senseless chat with his son and kiss him goodnight before he left. Also, he was relieved that, unlike Lulu, Gabe didn't make a point of letting him know he was aware of what was happening between him and Mia that night. The 'don't ask, don't tell' strategy worked well enough between them.

At the kitchen, he reached for the pot of floo powder resting over the fireplace mantel, grabbing a handful of it, which he used to materialize himself into the fireplace of his and Mia's old flat. The living room was the first thing he saw, noting the already set, candle-lit table before his wife made her way opposite him, coming from the kitchen. She was wearing a simple knee-length black dress which looked just right on her.

"Hi," Mia greeted, approaching him lazily.

"Hey," he replied as he cupped her face with his hands and brought his head down so their lips could meet in a long, sweet, greeting kiss. "This was a nice surprise."

"Well, I figured doing this at home with a baby waking us every three hours wouldn't be such a good idea," she explained, her hand reaching for his before they laced their fingers together. "Lulu said she didn't mind babysitting for a night. Besides, you're always the romantic one, so I decided this time would be on me to plan us a date."

He pressed a soft kiss on her lips again. "I think it's a wonderful idea. I take it this means Elizabeth actually gave you a clean health bill."

Mia nodded. "Of course. Why wouldn't she?"

"Well, you should probably ask your mother about that. Let's just say the initial information she gave me about tonight involved you going out with Elizabeth because we weren't allowed to shag for another two weeks," he said.

She gave him a sympathetic look, caressing his face softly in a supportive fashion. "Was that thought scary?"

"Terrifying. I'm afraid you'll have to… wear me out tonight so I can get a decent night of nightmare-free sleep," he told her in his best mock-serious tone. "I'm traumatized."

She kissed his cheek before they walked towards the sofa. "Don't worry, I'll take care of you later."

"You'd better," he said, pulling her onto his lap before she had the chance to sit down by his side, her legs stretching along the sofa. "So… I've got news."

"Good news?"

"Good and bad," he said. "I'll start with the bad – so… today I came across a certain piece of information concerning censoring charms and, guess what I found out, Mrs. Black? They don't involve any painful jolts whenever a person thinks of something 'inappropriate' like you told me they did. What do you have to say in your defence?"

She crossed her arms against her chest. "You inadvertently taught my son a handful of curse-words – that entitles me to make up anything I want to enhance the effect of any threat concerning that fact. Besides, it worked. You've been too scared to even think of uttering a curse around Mary, who's still very far away from speaking, much less Alex."

He glared. "Now I see how you take after Lulu," Sirius pointed out. "You can be just as bad as she is when you want to."

She smiled and kissed his cheek. "Quit being so dramatic – Lu's not even bad. Now get on with it and tell me about the good news if you're done with the 'bad' ones."

"Oh, the good ones. They're nothing, really," he said, casually. "Moony, you know, that old pal of mine who has tons issues about being a werewolf and who's been dating this really nice Metamorphagus?"

"Doesn't ring a bell," Mia joked.

"Well, then you probably don't care that much that he and the aforementioned really nice Metamorphagus eloped in the Ministry of Magic last Friday," Sirius said like it wasn't a big deal.

Mia's face shifted to disbelief immediately and she stood up. "You're kidding me."

"I said something along those lines too," Sirius pointed out. "But you'd better believe it. Our friend, Remus John Lupin got married. To Tonks. She was the one who proposed and everything. I swear it's true."

"I… wow," she said as she allowed Sirius to pull her back down onto his lap. "I don't know what to say. That's wonderful." She paused. "Should we go there now and congratulate them in person?"

Sirius shook his head. "You can do that tomorrow – they're coming by Grimmauld Place. Right now they're probably at Andromeda's breaking the news to her and Ted. Just leave them be for now."

"It's just… Merlin, I'm so happy for them," Mia said with an enormous smile.

"You're not the only one. Moony got the girl in the end. Or the girl got him, in this case," Sirius pointed out, brushing his hand along her leg. "Makes me think back to when _I _got the girl. Seems like such a long time ago."

She wrapped her arms around his neck. "Which time? When we first got together or when we got married?"

"Both times. Did I ever mention that giving us a try as something more than friends was the best decision I've ever made in my life?" he said, giving her lips a peck.

"Can't remember. But it'd the same with me," she replied, pulling his back by the collar of his shirt and deepening the kiss they'd shared before, sinking into it, even.

He felt like a teenage boy as he pulled his legs onto the sofa and felt Mia's body pressing over his while their lips moved together and their hands roamed everywhere, soon entering a full blown snog like those they had when they were young students at Hogwarts. Of course, their technique had improved in the meanwhile as had their knowledge of each other's bodies. They knew what to do, where to touch and when to do so. It was one of those good old snogs multiplied by a dozen in terms of enjoyment.

"Do you think dinner can wait?" he breathed against her lips at some point as they broke apart for a moment or two.

"Kreacher sent Cottage Pie – we can always heat it back later…" she told him in a breathy voice. "Take me to the bedroom. Now."

She didn't need to say that twice as he immediately lifted her body, picking her up with his arms, and hurried when carrying her to their small old bedroom, crossing every obstacle – from doorways to furniture – with determination. When he reached it, he saw the only light in the room was coming from the dozens of candles that had been spread all over it, causing a dim, yellowish and romantic environment. She'd put quite a work on it…

"Perfect," he whispered as he motioned towards the bed, placing her down on top of the dark red duvet.

"Kiss me," she demanded as soon as he let go of her. "I missed this. Come down here and make love to me, Sirius."

He grinned down at her, both warmly and playfully. His hand reached for her face, caressing her cheek with an incredible softness. "I promise, love, there's nothing else I'd rather do right now." And so he did.

**A/N: Well, I hope you all enjoyed the chapter :D It was honestly the best part of my week, between exams and presentations - tomorrow it's french, which I'm not so great at, so wish me luck. Feedback is welcome. Review!**


	15. Poison

**1 March 1997**

Hogsmeade was quite cold that morning even though it was less than a month away from spring, Mia thought as she walked, arm in arm with Sirius through the little village's empty streets. The visit from the students of Hogwarts had been cancelled. Again. She couldn't say it wasn't to be expected after Katie Bell had ended up badly cursed by a necklace she'd mysteriously acquired during one of the visits. Last McGonagall had told her, the young girl was just beginning to recover after having spent months comatose in St. Mungo's but it would still be weeks before she was able to come back to school. Now that Mia thought of it, she wasn't sure if she should be sorry for the kids not coming or relieved they'd be staying within the school grounds… Things had been frighteningly quiet lately.

The lack of attacks lately had kept them, the order and the newspapers wondering what Voldemort was planning next: some sort of massive catastrophic attack? A deeply covered infiltration? Over a month with nothing but three victim-free amateurish moves against muggles wasn't normal at all. They were being played – that was the truth. And no news felt much worse than bad news. Even now as she walked, she knew that, by her side, Sirius had his hand shoved into his pocket, where he clutched his wand, ready for any eventual attack. The simple thought that they had to be alert all the time was just revolting.

"You're awfully silent," her husband pointed out lightly, tightening just a little the arm that was wrapped around her. "Don't tell me you're worrying about the kids. Uncle Moony and Auntie Tonks will manage them on their own for sure. Or at least they'd better – see it as training for any future little Lupins."

She looked up at him and smiled. "I'm not worried about them. Kreacher's there, he'll help them if they need it. I was just thinking about this Hogsmeade visit having been cancelled," she said.

Sirius groaned. "I _hated _when that happened in our time. All those weeks planning…"

"… making sure you didn't take the same girl twice as your date…"

"… thinking what the guys and I needed to restock at Zonko's and Honeydukes," he said, ignoring her last addition. "It just sucked seeing it all ruined."

"I should probably point out that many of these times you couldn't come to Hogsmeade was because you and James had done something that had gotten you into detention," Mia stated with a smile as they walked beyond the village's limits.

He groaned. "Detention during Hogsmeade weekends should be forbidden by law. But I was referring to visits altogether cancelled, not those when only James and I couldn't come. The kids are probably all frustrated in the castle. Especially Ron, according to what Harry told me – it's his birthday today."

"Well, there's a good reason for this one to have been cancelled," she said with a more serious expression on her face. "You wouldn't want another one stuck in St. Mungo's for months the way Katie Bell has been, would you?"

"Of course not," he quickly assured her. "I'm just saying it sucks the kids can't do something they really like because of this… You-Know-Who crap. Anyway, I still wonder who gave the necklace to Katie. The aurors had been watching the village all around – it would be nearly impossible for a Death Eater sneak into Hogsmeade. It had to be done from the inside."

Mia sighed and stopped walking as they approached the Shrieking Shack, knowing what was coming. "And the top of your list of possible responsibles goes for…"

"Malfoy and Snape," he said plainly.

"The usual suspects," she said, dryly. "I'm shocked."

"Well, it's not my fault they're pretentious bastards who seem shady as hell _all the time_," he told her. "Harry agrees with me."

"Well, you're both biased by the fact that you don't like either of them at all," Mia told him simply. "You especially with Snape. Dumbledore trusts him – don't you think you should give him a chance?"

He looked annoyed. "Why is it that, all of a sudden you're defending Snape?"

She sighed, sitting on a large boulder. "Look, you know I'm not particularly fond of him either – he's bitter towards everyone, an awful teacher and treats my kids like criminals. But he was Lily's friend. Alright, I accept that maybe Dumbledore was capable of trusting too much but Lily… she wouldn't be friends with a completely awful person."

He took a deep breath, knowing that was a dodgy matter. "They stopped being friends long before she was killed, Mia. She wouldn't have ended a friendship lightly either. He called her a Mudblood – that doesn't seem to me like something a good friend would do."

"I think he regrets it – he gave Malfoy the detention of a lifetime in Harry's second year for calling Hermione a Mudblood. That sounds significant to me," she stated.

"Too little, too late."

Mia huffed in frustration. "Well, you lied to me and risked your life last year in a way that hurt me enormously and I still forgave you, Sirius." She immediately regretted saying that, seeing him visibly tense. She got up and approached her husband, remaining behind him as he stood still and rested one hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"It's fine," he mumbled without looking at her. "I get the point."

She could tell he was upset and moved in order to stand opposite him. "No, I really am sorry for bringing that up. I had no right." She tentatively wrapped her arms around him and rested her head against his chest. She was hoping the physical contact would confirm to him the fact that she was really sorry. "I didn't do it to upset you – I'm just trying to prove the point that people do hurtful things without thinking and they still deserve forgiveness." She sighed against his chest, feeling his tension disappear slowly. "Can this be one of these times? I meant every word when I told you we'd put what happened past us. It just… seemed like a good example. Stupid."

His hands finally moved to her, one resting on her back and the other on her hair. "It's okay. I do get what you were trying to say but…" He sighed, trying to think of what to say next and she pulled away slightly, just enough so she was looking up at him. "Look, I love you for everything you are and trying to give Snape the benefit of the doubt even though he's always been an arse to you is, well, part of you. But not of me. I guess he and I are just this kind of people that are born to hate each other – if I ever considered trusting him, Mia, it would have to be for a very good, life of death, reason. And I'm pretty sure it's the same with Harry and Malfoy. Some things you cannot change."

Mia sighed. "I guess I knew that deep down," she mumbled. "I still say Lily wouldn't have been his friend of there wasn't good in him."

He sighed. Some part of him – the part where his loyalty to Lily and James lay – hopes it was true. "Well, even I know it would be awfully tasteless to make a wager on his allegiances, so how about we drop it instead? Moony mentioned the twins would be here this morning to check on Zonko's old shop for their new branch – we could drop by there and take a look ourselves and then a grab a butterbeer with them at the Three Broomsticks before we go pay the kids a visit at Hogwarts."

"Hum, since it's still ten in the morning and way too early to grab a butterbeer, I'll have to insist we visit the kids first _and then_ go meet the twins," Mia pointed out.

He sighed. "You're no fun at all."

She smiled. "Sure I'm not."

He chuckled. "Fine, we'll go see the kids first. But can I at least have butterbeer for lunch? _Only_ butterbeer? I'm in a drinking mood today."

Mia rolled her eyes as he wrapped one arm around her and they resumed walking back to the other side of the village, where the Hogwarts gates were. "You're such a kid."

"Well, aren't we all?"

* * *

Someone had to be kidding him – someone really had, Harry thought as he and Ginny all but dragged Ron all the way from the Common Room to Slughorn's office.

Sure, he'd known things between Ron and Lavender weren't all that good lately. It was ridiculous how only a few weeks before they'd been snogging every waking moment and now his best friend had turned to see _Lav-Lav _as some sort of plague to avoid most of the time. Not that he felt at all saddened by that fact. Truth was, as Ginny kept saying, being around Lavander was like swimming in a pool of the most mushy and annoying traits a human being could possibly get. The fact that she wasn't evil was a point in her favour yet he hoped, for Lavender's sake, that she'd grow become a less… flashy person. But for now, why Ron wouldn't just go ahead and break up with her instead of avoiding her was a mystery to him…

However, no matter how bad Ron's relationship with Lavender was, the last thing he would have expected his best friend to be doing in their dorm in the morning of his birthday was a love declaration… directed to an absent _Romilda Vane_. If he'd thought something was wrong by the time he heard the desperate and pitiful pledges of love, he was sure of it in the minute Ron attacked him because of believing it was a very elaborate joke. Who could blame him, really? It _sounded _like a joke.

By the time he had Ron restrained just so no fists would hit his face that day, the answer to his best friend's odd behaviour came in the form of Chocolate Cauldrons – love-potion-spiked Chocolate cauldrons. Harry could barely remember when Romilda had offered those to him – certainly before Christmas. He vaguely recalled her intercepting him on his way to the dorm after an exhausting Quidditch practice and accepting those chocolates just to get her off his back, only to throw them into his trunk and never think of them again. It was irony in its best form – if Ron hadn't been such a glutton and launched himself at the chocolates when Harry had taken them off his trunk while looking for something in it, he wouldn't have gotten himself in that pickle.

So, after he'd managed to calm Ron down, convinced him to accompany him to Slughorn's office under the cover that Romilda was there, Ginny – who he was supposed to have been hanging out with instead of his love-stricken best friend – offered to accompany him and Ron down to Slughorn's office. That was, after she and Izzy mocked the redheaded boy for some good ten minutes – he had to admit it was hard not to…

"You know, I still think we should have just set him loose and had a laugh with whatever he did," Ginny whispered to Harry as she walked by his side. "He had it coming for all the bad imagery of him snogging Lavender that has been haunting my nightmares."

As he firmly secured Ron's arm with his hand – Merlin knew what a bloke under the influence of love potions past its expiration time could do if they lost him – Harry allowed himself to laugh for a moment before he felt a pang of sympathy for his best friend. "It's his birthday, Gin. We should be hexed for letting him make more of a fool of himself than he already has."

She sighed. "Let me tell you you're too nice for your own good, Mr. Potter." But then, despite the disapproving tone of her voice, she smiled up at him for a moment. "I suppose we could be merciful for a day. But if the twins got him in a situation like this instead of my magnanimous self…"

"I can imagine how that would turn out," Harry said with a laugh before pulling Ron back to the right way as he started to move the wrong one. "Down the staircase, mate, not up," he told him.

Ron mumbled a 'thanks' and eagerly returned to the right path – he seemed to be jumping between ecstatic and thoughtfully-silent modes, though he'd been sticking with the latter since Ginny had lied to him and said Romilda liked contained blokes.

Harry turned back to his girlfriend. "Where were we? Ah, the twins. If it was up to them, he'd be proposing to Romilda by the end of the day."

"Eloping if they found a way to pull it off," she added with a grin. "I ought to pay back that little tart for this. Trying to drug my boyfriend with love-potion – _drugging _my brother. Bloody minx. When I get my hands on her, she'll he sniffing bats for a week!"

He spoke dryly. "We'll have a detention date, then. How's your Tuesday? Snape's got me cleaning the detention files again. I'm about to reach the hundredth detention slip on Sirius and my dad together and I haven't gotten past their fourth year yet."

"Prolific detentioneers, I see," she observed with an amused smile.

Ron suddenly turned to face the couple. "What are you two whispering about? Is it Romilda? Did she say something about me?"

Ginny nodded, a mocking glint in her eyes. "No, Harry and I were only discussing the colour of his robes for your wedding with Romilda. The best man has to look good." She turned to her boyfriend. "You'd look lovely in green."

Even though he knew she was kidding, he blushed. "Thanks. Er… so would you."

Ron sighed dreamily and returned to thoughtfully-silent mode, likely imagining Romilda in white… Just as they reached Slughorn's floor, they quite literally ran into Sirius and Mia, who were climbing up.

"Wow, hey, kid. We were just going up to say hello to you. Hi there, Ginny," Sirius said.

"Hi," the redheaded girl replied with a smile.

"Er… Izzy's upstairs at the common room. We need to take care of a small thing now but it shouldn't take long. We'll meet you there," Harry said quickly, hoping they wouldn't notice Ron's state. It would only be more embarrassing for him…

He wasn't so lucky, as Mia quickly saw it. "What's wrong with him? Is he ill? Ron?"

"I'm in love," he said in a deliriously happy tone.

"Good for you," Sirius said, clapping him on the back. "Finally put the pieces together with Hermione?"

Ron shot him an appalled look like Sirius had just implied he was in love with the giant squid instead. "Hermione? No. Romilda. My sweet, pretty…" He stopped talking and sighed, leaning against the stair's novel post before letting out an overly dramatic sigh.

Sirius turned to Harry with a confused look on his face. "Hum? Romilda? As in Vane?" _Babbs's daughter,_ he thought in disgust.

"Long story. He accidentally took some love potion," Harry explained. "We're taking him to Slughorn for some antidote."

Mia looked at Ron with concern all over her face. "I don't know, Harry, maybe Madam Pomfrey would be more adequate for something like this."

Harry shook his head. "No, the seventh years were brewing the antidote for love-potions in Slughorn's class last week – he probably has plenty of it stashed. No need to go bother Madam Pomfrey – she'd ask too many questions and it would be too embarrassing for him…" Also it would give him a good excuse to talk to the old teacher and ask him for the bit of information Dumbledore had requested from him, which had Slughorn avoiding him lately…

"More than it already is?" Sirius asked with a grin as Ron was all sighs right opposite him – he could almost see the heart-shaped smoke coming out of the boy's ears. Sirius snorted. "Boy, he's got it bad… Why don't you improvise some poetry for her, Ron? I bet she'd be impressed."

"Poetry… I…" He paused, seemingly composing the poem in his head.

"Merlin, please don't give him more ideas – he wouldn't shut up earlier," Harry said with an exasperated tone

"You know, you could just leave him like that for a while longer, fetch a camera and snap a few pictures of what he does."

"I completely agree," Ginny pointed out. "But Harry insists it's wrong doing that on his birthday."

"Because it _is_," he stated, turning to Sirius. "Did you ever do that to my father? Snap picture of him drunk?"

He grinned. "You should try a revealing charm on those 'empty' pages of his wedding album, that's all I'm saying. But I'm sure Fred and George would pay a good price any of those pict… ouch!" he complained as Mia shoved her elbow into his ribs. "What was that for? I wasn't saying anything wrong…"

"Of course you weren't," Mia said sarcastically. "This is serious! He could hurt himself or do something really stupid."

Ginny huffed. "Like praising Romilda's buttocks in front of me and Izzy, not to mention Hermione who'd just walked in? Yeah, he's already done that."

"I reckon Hermione's handprint won't leave his face for a few hours," Harry mumbled.

"Hermione doesn't understand our love," Ron said, lamely. "It's so beautiful, so…"

"…nauseating," Ginny offered under her breath.

Still worried, Mia lifted two fingers in front of him. "How many of these do you see, Ron?"

The redhead let out a sigh. "Two. I see just fine – I just don't see Romilda…" He turned to Harry. "Can we head to Slughorn's now?"

Harry shot his godmother a look that clearly begged her to just go along with it.

She sighed. "Fine. Take him to Slughorn. But if he doesn't get better…"

"Madam Pomfrey. We got it," Ginny assured her, grabbing her brother's arm before he had a chance to start walking there on his own.

Sirius looked rather disappointed. "Is there at least any chance you could provide some memories for pensieve screening?" he asked, earning a disapproving look from his wife. "For study purpose, only, of course. The twins need to be aware of the consequences of their love potions…"

"Study purposes my arse. You really need to start working on your excuses, Sirius. If Mary could speak already, even she could say that was rubbish," Mia told him with a sceptical look on her face.

"It was not _that _bad…"

"Well, I guess we'll leave them here to discuss that on their own," Harry mumbled to Ginny as they motioned to walk away. "Meet you guys later, then," he told his godparents with a chuckle before they told him to meet them in the kitchens later in stead of the Common Room – it would probably make a few students uncomfortable having two teachers hanging out in their Common Room.

Later, just as they were reaching Slughorn's office and Ron was nearly impossible to put up with due to all the excitement of seeing Romilda, Harry turned to Ginny and whispered in her year. "So, how long are you planning to tease him about this love potion thing?"

"Oh, longer than any calendar can mark," she said with a smile.

Little did they know that, in a matter of minutes, laughing would be the farthest thing away from their minds…

* * *

Mia couldn't help finding it odd that one hour had already passed since Harry and Ginny had taken Ron to Slughorn's office and they still hadn't made it to the kitchens. But then again, Slughorn could talk for hours and hours with no end – or at least that was with Elizabeth said. Mia wouldn't know since, unlike her two best friends, she hadn't been a member of the Slug Club.

"… and apparently, since the owner of Zonko's has vanished and the shop was closed, the twins want to buy it and make a new branch in there," Sirius was telling his daughter as they sat by a long wooden table.

"Oh, are they moving here?" Izzy asked eagerly. "It's nice having them around. George mentioned over the holidays that Fred and Angelina are getting serious. He joked that sometime this year he might end up getting kicked out of the flat for her to move there."

Sirius snorted. "Well, unless Fred and George are planning to still share a house after they're married and have kids, they will have to start warming up to the idea of moving away from each other. But it's them – living together or not, they'll always be the twins. Now, give me that," he said, nicking the plate of treacle tart he and Izzy had managed to charm away from the house elves and taking a spoonful of it. Then, he glanced at Mia, noting how silent she was, not even having scolded him and Izzy for spoiling their lunches with the tart. "Your mom is not with us," he whispered Izzy, who chuckled.

"Doesn't look like she is," she agreed with a chuckle. She cleared her throat and raised her voice. "How's the view from the moon, Mom?"

Mia turned to them, confused. "Hum?"

"Welcome back," Sirius said with a grin. "We're assuming your mind was just lost somewhere in deep space since you looked so absent."

"I was just thinking," she said, turning her face to the portrait-covered doorway, which had just suddenly sounded open. McGonagall stepped in, looking pale and grim and Mia knew immediately that something was wrong. "What happened? Is it Harry?"

McGonagall shook her head. "Miss Weasley. Ginny. She was poisoned."

At the table, Izzy immediately dropped her fork and got up in a flash, paling as well. "Ginny? What…? When…? Is she…?"

"Poppy says she should be alright thanks to Harry. He fed her a bezoar just in time," McGonagall assured her before Izzy or anyone else had the time to ask if she was even alive. "He mentioned you were here and I thought you ought to be there with him for…"

They were already heading to the Hospital Wing before she could finish, Sirius leading the way, his arm supporting his daughter's frame. It didn't matter that McGonagall said she was going to be fine – they needed to _know._ Ginny was family, she was the best thing that had happened in Harry's life. It was their duty to be there when she needed and to be there when Harry needed them.

When they reached the Hospital Wing's corridor, not more than four or five minutes after having left the kitchens, it was easy to spot their godson. He silently sat on the stone floor in front of the infirmary's large doors with his knees bent and his back supported by the wall while a bench lay forgotten only a few feet away. His face was awfully pale and tense, not to mention he appeared to be looking at the infinite, no doubt terrified from having just seen his girlfriend nearly die. Sitting with him were Ron and Hermione, any sign of hostility between the latter two gone in benefit of helping each other and Harry through Ginny's situation.

"Harry," Mia called as she approached.

Her godson lifted his head to see them and immediately motioned to stand up. Before he could even think of saying anything, Mia took a step in his direction and wrapped him in a firm, motherly hug, rubbing his back as she held him. He held back just as strongly.

Harry seemed to relax a little against her, recalling that, as far as he could remember, Mia had always been there to give him a hug when he needed. Before, when he was little and only bad dreams or easily solved matters haunted him, that simple gesture used to make everything bad go away. Now that the world had revealed itself to him – the bad and the ugly taking the lead – his godmother's hugs were only a temporary fix. Yet, he'd always be thankful for them. He'd needed one especially then.

"Are you okay?" Mia asked as she pulled away and saw from the corner of her eye McGonagall slipping discretely into the Hospital Wing.

He nodded faintly. "She… it was so fast. One minute we were laughing, the other she was just…"

"It's okay, honey. She'll be okay," Mia told him softly, quietly nudging him in the direction of the bench while Sirius followed her along with Izzy. While she sat down with Harry, the other too remained on their. "Can you tell me how it happened or would you rather not?"

"I… It was an accident. Or at least I think it was. Slughorn looked shocked too," he rambled. "After he fixed Ron with the antidote for the love potion, Slughorn offered us all a drink of mead because, you know, it's Ron's birthday and it was already going pretty badly… I don't think the bottle was ever opened before – it looked sealed before he opened it, you know? We all got served a glass of it and Ginny took a small sip right away just to know what it tasted like…"

"She always does that when she'd drinking or eating something she's never had before," Izzy said as she stood by her father's side.

Harry nodded. "Says it's to avoid bad surprises." _The irony…_ "Then, Slughorn had barely started to say a toast and she just started breathing really shallowly and then dropped to the floor convulsing." His body went cold just by remembering that. "Slughorn just stopped thinking and Ron kneeled near her, shouting her name. Then I remembered the book – it said a bezoar could cure any type of poison and I knew there was one in Slughorn's potion kit… Ginny got better when I gave it to her." He gritted his teeth. "I should have just listened to you, aunt Mia. I should have come straight here and not to Slughorn's."

Instead of Mia, Sirius was the one to intervene by shaking his head. "It would've happened sooner or later, kid. Maybe not to Ginny but probably to Slughorn himself. You know the old guy loves his booze – someday he'd have downed the whole bottle by himself and there wouldn't have been anyone around to shove and bezoar down his throat and save his life. Don't even think of blaming yourself for that, Harry."

"You saved her life," Izzy said in a low, respectful tone. "Again."

Harry sighed, thinking he'd been so close to freezing like Slughorn had, and then gulped. "They won't let me go in and see her. Madam Pomfrey said I had to wait. I need to know Ginny is really alright."

"I'm sure she is…" Mia started.

"But I _need _to see. I love her." All the times he'd allowed himself to imagine a future with Ginny, he'd only allowed himself to think that if they didn't get a chance was because he hadn't made it through the war – he'd never considered _she_ might not make it. "I can't lose her."

"It probably won't be long before you're allowed in," Sirius said. He felt sympathetic about it – not so long before, he's been the one craving for news. He'd been the one feeling his heart unsteady because the woman he loved was in bad shape. "It's Ginny – sooner than you'll know, that one will be here shooting bat-bogey hexes at anyone that dares annoy her."

They spent several more minutes waiting until Mia managed to get herself inside Madam Pomfrey's domain in order to get some news from how Ginny was doing. Arthur and Molly soon showed up with the twins escorted by Dumbledore, their faces blank as well, and, even before going in to see their daughter, the plump redhead woman enveloped Harry in a tearful tight hug, thanking him over and over for saving her daughter's life.

"Harry, what can we say? You saved Ginny in the chamber… you saved Arthur from the snake last year… now Ginny again…" Molly sobbed as he awkwardly patted her back. "We owe you so much…"

Mia approached, coming from the infirmary and gave them a smile. "She's starting to wake up. Poppy says a couple of people can come in. Molly, Arthur, I suppose you want to…"

Arthur nodded. "Yes, we'll go. But Harry's coming with is. We'll talk Poppy into letting us all in."

"Yes, Ginny will want to see you, dear," Molly told Harry, drying her eyes with a handkerchief her husband had gave her earlier. "Come along."

"She'll be alright," Mia assured him one more time, gripping his shoulder before Harry followed his girlfriend's parents inside. The, she looked around and took a breath. Izzy seemed to be calmer too, sitting with Ron and Hermione talking in hushed tones as a group of curious students watched from the end of the corridor. Things had turned out well… that time.

Only a few feet away from them, Dumbledore spoke with Slughorn about the incident and one single sentence concerning the poisoned bottle caught their attention. _"…got it from the Three Broomsticks last December as a present… for you, Albus._"

Sirius and Mia's eyes met for a moment and they quietly left for an empty balcony just around the corner.

"First the necklace, not the bottle," Sirius said. "They really are trying to off Dumbledore."

Mia nodded, feeling chilly and not just from the wind. "And they don't really care if anyone else is harmed for it."

"Well, looks like the attacks haven't stopped, after all," he said.

"No, they've just gotten subtler," Mia agreed, worried.

"Can't tell which is worse, honestly," Sirius said. "This or the other attacks." The not knowing, the unexpected… he hated it. He feared it, he admitted with a sigh. "And I'm not sure I want to find out…"

**A/N: So sorry for the late chapter but, well, I had no way of updating later. I'll just say this: dumb anti-virus, contamined laptop that was useless for a few days, several files currupted among which was the original version of the chapter... no backup. _Backup your files, people. take my advice..._ Anyway, I hope you like the chapter even though this version was written in little more than a day. Feedback is welcome. Review!**


	16. Bludger

The news of Ginny's poisoning seemed, for the first days after the incident had taken place, to make an appearance in every conversation that took place in the school. Some people were shocked and fearful, which seemed to combine with the most recent wave of student-withdrawings the school had suffered, others were mainly indifferent mostly because they barely knew her and others – a group mainly formed by classic 'bad Slytherins' and spiteful young girls helplessly developing crushes on Harry – were pleased.

Over the years Harry had gotten used to the not-so-whispered nasty comments about him coming from Slytherins such as Malfoy's closer group of friends that was formed by Crabbe, Goyle, Parkinson and Zabini. Yet, that developed resistance didn't seem to apply to when those comments – though still directed to him – concerned pitying the fact that there was a bezoar in the room to save Ginny in time – each time he heard that, Harry saw himself clenching his fists so one of them wouldn't end up buried in one of their faces. Surprisingly, he hadn't been the one losing it – Izzy had. After a particularly malicious comment about her best friend, she had ended up casting a furnunculus hex on Pansy Parkinson right in the middle of a hallway, hardly caring about the dozens of Slytherins witnessing it or the three days of detention that Snape had given her. Though he'd tried – really tried – to drag Harry along into the accusation, lack of proof hadn't allowed the spiteful teacher to do so…

Romilda had also been another issue to deal with. The three weeks of detention McGonagall had given her for messing with Love Potions – _'…an invasion of one's mind and a shameful twisting of a person's feelings that should be seen as a criminal act in the Wizarding World,' _Harry recalled the head of his house shouting at Romilda loud enough for all the school to hear– didn't seem to have destroyed her hopes concerning a romance with Harry. Clearly there wasn't a drop of shame in her: she'd started following him everywhere, very eager to know if Ginny was going to be okay because '_she was such a dear friend' _and constantly offering him a shoulder to lean on, which he kept awkwardly refusing. It all culminated to an afternoon when she'd had the nerve to try and follow him into the Hospital Wing when he was visiting Ginny and he'd ended up yelling at her – as odd as it seemed coming from him – and telling her with no flourishes whatsoever that there was no chance he'd _ever_ consider going out with her after she'd tried to slip him a love potion. He wasn't sure if it had been pride wounded by him yelling at her or pure heartbreak but, from that day on, Romilda had most definitely left him alone.

Meanwhile, the Order was worried and the meetings had grown increasingly tense since Ginny's poisoning, which had revealed a quiet attempt on Dumbledore's life. The main issue involved the new position Dumbledore should take in terms of protecting himself.

"You need protection, Albus," Mad-Eye advised during an Order meeting taking place five days after the incident with the poisoned bottle of mead at the headquarters that used to be the basement of Lily and James's old house. "Someone tried to kill you – we can't just leave you unprotected. Kingsley has already said he can provide an auror to keep an eye on you. That and having your food tested should do it."

"Thank you, Alastor, but I don't think I want a bodyguard or my food to be tested every time I'm hungry," the headmaster calmly dismissed. "There is no reason for alarm."

"No reason? This is the second time someone tries to kill you this year!"

As he and Mia sat at the long rectangular table around each all members remained, Sirius could swear he saw a vein on Moody's forehead thumping hard, which made him realize just how angry Dumbledore's lax attitude made the former auror.

"Alastor is right at some rate, Albus," McGonagall stated. "Your life is endangered. That is something we can't ignore."

"Everyone's lives are in danger, Minerva. Why should I have someone always ready to protect me when all others don't?"

"You are the head of this movement! The Order _needs_ you," Mad-Eye stated.

The headmaster stood up from his chair, towering over everyone. Sirius noted that his expression, which had been calm until then, had shifted to… disappointment? Sadness? Somethign along those lines. "What I am, my friends, is an old man. And like every man, sooner or later I will meet an end as the human condition dictates. This movement – the Order – doesn't need a leader – it needs people who believe in it. And, sooner or later, the world will have to live without me in it, fight without me in it. So I keep my opinion, Alastor. I don't need extra protection – I will manage on my own as everyone else does."

There was a long moment of silence after his words, during which everyone wondered about the meaning of them – to Sirius and Mia, it sounded like a warning. To which, however, they didn't know. They didn't even want to try and guess.

Mad-Eye was the first one to speak and his tone didn't seem happy at all. "That's plain reckless," he said bluntly as Dumbledore sat back again. "You should…"

A fake cough coming from Snape interrupted him and the former potions master spoke. "If I may, I believe the headmaster is right."

"Of course you do," Sirius mumbled, loud enough for half the table to hear. He had a feeling Mad-Eye mirrored his thought: agreeing with leaving Dumbledore unprotected sounded awfully catty coming from a known 'reformed' Death Eater.

"Sirius," Mia hissed by his side. The look she gave him clearly warned him not to make a scene.

At the opposite side of the table, Snape seemed to ignore him. "As I said, I agree with the headmaster. I'd say not _trusting_ him to protect himself after such a long, fulfilled life is simply _insulting_."

"I am not insulted," Dumbledore assured. "Though, as Severus is declaring and which I agree with, I like to believe I am capable of handling my own protection."

The discussion went on for several more minutes with a number of other members of the Order stepping in and out of it with suggestions and diplomatic words and, in the end, it was decided that, though Dumbledore wouldn't be getting any extra protection, several Aurors would be assigned to protect Hogwarts and its boundaries for the students' sakes, a matter that Molly had been understandably insistent about after what had happened to Ginny.

Afterwards, as everyone was leaving the headquarters, only Mad-Eye remaining back to argue some more with Dumbledore, Sirius and Mia ended up standing with Remus and Tonks near the fireplace waiting for everyone else to floo away before they did.

"Was it me," Tonks started, her tone inquisitive, "or Dumbledore's speech about the 'world needing to fight without him in it' had a deeper meaning than it showed?"

"Nope, it wasn't just you," Sirius confirmed. "Do you think he's ill?"

"Not _ill_ particularly," Remus responded. "But it sounded to me like he doesn't expect to live through this war."

Mia swallowed hard. "That's not good. Of all people… of all people I think Dumbledore is among those with the largest odds of living. With everything he's done, all the battles he fought. You-Know-Who _fears_ him."

"Well, that's probably why he's trying to get him out of the way," Sirius stated. "Look, maybe we're overreacting, trying to find meanings in his words that are not there. Maybe the guy was just feeling depressed today." How funny was it that even he doubted his own words?

"Maybe," Tonks mumbled, not buying it either. Dumbledore had been acting too odd. And he hadn't seemed depressed at all. Disappointed, maybe. But not depressed. She sighed. "Well, the two of us should get going," she stated, looking up at her husband. "You need your rest tonight – rough night tomorrow."

None of them needed to ask why – full moon would take place in the following night. Despite the shadow that surrounded that occasion for Remus, Mia felt glad that now their friend had someone – his _wife_ – to look after him during such a hard time.

"Your girl is right, Moony," Sirius pointed out. "Go home and just forget this. Tomorrow I'll meet you at the usual place." By usual place, Sirius meant the little country house that had once belonged to Remus's parents, which, beside the Shrieking Shack, was still the safest place for Remus to transform, having a shed that had been built by Remus's father for that sole purpose.

After Remus and Tonks left to their flat, Sirius and Mia followed to their own home and the matter of Dumbledore's words was quickly dropped, though hardly forgotten. Of one thing Sirius was sure – if Dumbledore didn't tell them about it, they'd never have the nerve to ask. All that was left was waiting.

* * *

While the members of the Order disbanded to their homes, Harry sat by the side of Ginny's bed in the Hospital Wing along with Ron and Hermione, worrying about more trivial matters, such as the Quidditch team. There was a game in two days and Madam Pomfrey had just told them that not only wouldn't Ginny be fit to play but also she couldn't go to the stadium and watch. They were missing _another_ chaser.

"Dean Thomas is already replacing Katie and he's the only backup chaser," Harry told Ginny.

Ginny grunted. "We should have picked two or three backup chasers just in case," she said, irritably. "Maybe if I work smoothly enough, Madam Pomfrey will let me play." Apart from a persistent lack of appetite and 'slight' lack of strength, she felt perfectly normal – she could be fit for a game with a few strengthening potions and days of training.

"No, she won't and neither will I," Harry told her, surprisingly firmly. "Your health comes first, Gin. That's not negotiable. I'm captain."

Before Ginny could protest, Hermione jumped in her best friend's defence. "I think losing a game wouldn't be as bad as being stuck in the Hospital Wing for another week if anything went wrong," she offered before turning to Harry. "What about Izzy? I've seen her flying at the Burrow. You could ask her to play after her detention is over."

Harry shook his head. "She'll refuse. She doesn't like to play 'real' games – too many rules, she says. Plus, well, she misses more than she scores as a chaser – it's aunt Mia's side of the gene-pool. If anything, she can play a remotely decent keeper when she's inspired to it," Harry said.

"Well, Ron will have to do it, then," Ginny stated, leaning back against the pillows of her bed and crossing her arms.

Her brother opened his eyes wide in disbelief. "Me?"

"Yeah, you. You always played Chaser in those three versus three Quidditch games you used to play with Bill, Charlie, Percy and the twins when we were younger."

"Because Bill and Charlie wouldn't let me be the Keeper," he pointed out before turning to Harry in order to explain. "The game pretty much only had Keepers and Chasers because we didn't own a snitch for a Seeker to catch and Mom wouldn't let us anywhere near Bludgers."

"He was decent enough. His team usually won," Ginny stated.

"Well, the problem is solved, then," Hermione easily declared.

Ron shook his head. "Not so fast – my team usually won because _Percy_ was always in the opposite team and he couldn't score to save his life."

Ginny gave him an accusatory look. "If you weren't such chauvinistic gits and had let me play…"

"You'll never let that go, will you?"

She shook her head and glared some more. "When I'm a professional Quidditch Player and some reporter asks me if my dear brothers supported my love for Quidditch from a young age, I'll be more than happy to respond with a huge 'no'. Still, Ron, you're playing chaser the day after tomorrow. Gotta take one for the team."

Ron groaned but didn't protest. There just wasn't time to organize new tryouts and pick someone remotely good from all the candidates… He'd have to do it, as much as it annoyed him.

"But who'll be the Keeper, then?" Hermione asked, though she suspected she knew the answer.

Harry sighed. "McLaggen." As soon as he said that, there were four simultaneous groans, yet nobody tried to change his mind – they all knew that, as unpleasant as the seventh year might be, he'd been the second best at the tryouts – maybe _the_ best if Hermione hadn't confunded him…

"You'd better tell that git not to warm up to the position," Ron told his best mate with narrowed eyes. "And if I suck as a chaser…"

"… nobody will blame you," Harry assured with a huff. "Our team seems like a patchwork quilt already. Odds are against us, anyway."

Ginny punched him lightly on the arm. "Stop moping, Potter. If we lose this game, we're still on the run for the cup. Next game I'll be there and we'll win."

"Pretty sure of yourself, aren't you?" Harry asked her, half-grinning just as Madam Pomfrey approached Ginny's bed, carrying a glass of a greyish steaming liquid with her.

His girlfriend frowned immediately. "Not again. That stuff tastes like sewage water."

Madam Pomfrey didn't seem amused or insulted, keeping a firm look on her face. "Well, Miss Weasley, if you were brave enough to taste sewage water, I'm sure you'll do just fine with this potion." She handed Ginny the potion and remained by the bed, arms crossed, apparently waiting for her to drink it. "Well?"

With a huff, the redhead took a sip knowing it was hopeless to fight back. As soon as the taste of the liquid touched her tongue, she made a face. The following sips were just as painful and, by the time the glass was empty, Ginny looked absolutely disgusted. The healer seemed satisfied enough, picking up the empty glad and waking away – but not before reminding Harry, Ron and Hermione that they had ten minutes before curfew in order to leave, a fact that all ignored. "I can't believe that stuff is actually appetite-enhancing potion. The taste alone makes me want to jinx my mouth away."

"Doesn't look as disgusting as polijuice potion," Ron commented. "That one tasted like mud."

"Well, you should try this one, then," she said, dryly. "Anyway, where were we before?"

"Ron's playing Chaser, McLaggen will replace him as Keeper," Harry reminded her.

"Right, well, don't let the fact that he's made it into the team get it McLaggen's head. Cocky as he is, it will swell so much people will have trouble flying near him. Then again, his big head might come handy defending the goal posts… Just be careful with him – overconfident prats often end up causing trouble."

"I don't doubt that," her boyfriend agreed as Madam Pomfrey returned, once again reminding them of the curfew.

While Hermione stepped out dragging Ron along against his will, Harry stayed behind a little longer. "Have I mentioned I'm really sorry Madam Pomfrey won't let you play? You're our best chaser."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "We both know you only want me to play because you want someone around to share a victory snog with you as soon as the game is over."

"Well, anything involving victory is unlike this time around…"

"An end-of-game snog, then," she stated.

"How about a goodnight snog for now instead?" he suggested, noting Madam Pomfrey had busied herself messing with the potions cabinet.

Ginny smiled. "I could live with that."

Their lips barely managed to remain together for two or three seconds before the hectic school matron's voice sounded again – great time she'd picked to turn her attention to them again. "Potter! Unless what Miss Weasley is doing to you right now is some sort of mouth-to-mouth reanimation technique because you've stopped breathing, you'd better be out of this infirmary in the next ten seconds before I banish from entering here again!"

He groaned. "We'll resume this tomorrow, then." And then, he headed off.

* * *

Two days later, in the morning when the Quidditch game took place, it was clear Ginny had been right about McLaggen: less than thirty minutes into the game, not only had he attempted several times to step over Harry and act as the team's captain but also managed to somehow get his hands on a beater's bat and, while 'showing some moves' to said beater right in the middle of the game, aim a Bludger straight to Harry's head. Accidentally.

After getting over the panic of watching her godson falling down several feet from his broomstick until Sirius had caught him by flying as fast as he could on his broom, Mia, who'd been watching the game from the stands as she did every time Harry played, had become immensely frustrated.

"You know, I feel like I should be surprised when this kind of stuff happens to Harry but, honestly, I don't think I can anymore," Mia told her husband as they stood in the Hospital Wing by the window, leaving Ginny alone by Harry's bed, talking to his yet unconscious form – Ron, Hermione and Izzy had been there earlier until Madam Pomfrey had shooed them away to the Great Hall, saying it was lunch time. "Does that make me an awful mother? Seeing Harry in the Hospital Wing and being annoyed because it happened again instead of desperately begging him to wake up?"

Sirius shook his head – he was still wearing his Quidditch Referee equipment, not having had time to change in the middle of all the confusion. "Of course not. First of all, you know he must be waking any minute. Second, the kid certainly spends more time in the Hospital Wing than anyone else I know – I'd say being annoyed about it is not wrong at all. Besides, we've been here in this infirmary way too many times lately."

"_Too _many," she agreed. Just in the previous week it had been Ginny. Now, even before the girl was out herself, there was Harry. Again.

"Most of the time it's not even his fault. Trouble does chase him around, as he says…"

"I wonder how this will end," Mia mumbled. She didn't mean the constant visits to the Hospital Wing – she meant Harry's… fate. Because that was what everything was leading up to, right? They knew he was supposed to face Voldemort. They knew one of them would live and the other wouldn't and she wouldn't dare herself to believe Harry wouldn't be the one who lived. But when would it happen? How? Would it be a battle? Or something incredibly sudden like an ambush? And would Harry get hurt somehow? Would other people? So many questions and almost no answers at all. She didn't even know _why_ she was asking them now. Maybe Harry having gotten hurt in a simple Quidditch game had reminded her of his mortality or maybe Dumbledore's rather unsettling words the other day had gotten to her more than she'd realized. She looked up and saw her husband's eyes on her, observing. "What?"

"You'll go mad if you keep thinking of it, Mia," he told her and she didn't have any doubt he knew exactly what was going on inside her head, what she'd meant with her earlier words. It was hard to explain how he knew it. He just did.

"Sometimes I can't help it," she said. "Don't you? Think of it, I mean"

He nodded – he thought of it more than she thought. "Gets me as far as you've gone – nowhere. It doesn't matter what we imagine or try to guess – what matters is that the kid is ready for _anything._ We're doing our parts; Dumbledore is helping him too with those lessons of his…"

He was so secretive about those lessons, Mia thought. She hoped it was because there was nothing important to say yet – she trusted he'd tell them anything he learned if it was important. Then again, he was growing up, becoming his own person – who knew if the secrecy wasn't just one of the traits that had arrived along with his teenage years.

"You know," Sirius told her, hoping he could change the subject as he looked at Ginny and the still unconscious Harry – the subjects _needed _to be changed, "a few years ago – or more like a couple of decades ago – I happened to be the knocked out patient with the cracked skull and you were the pretty girl sitting by the side of my bed. If I recall it well, we weren't dating yet."Memories, not sad memories, usually had a positive effect in her mood.

"No, we weren't. I was terrified when I saw it – thought the Bludger had broken your neck," she said with a sigh. "James and I stood outside until Poppy let us in. Then, I stayed here until she kicked me out." Mia managed a small smile. "You're not going to go all cheesy on me and tell me that was the moment you fell in love with me, are you?"

He snorted. "That was one of many. It's safe to say that me falling for you, Mrs. Black, was a gradual process." Sirius turned his face to the younger couple. "I bet she's bullying him awake. Let's listen."

Because Harry's bed wasn't very far away from their spot near the window, Ginny's voice wasn't hard to distinguish if they were silent.

"…_d__on't wake up in the next hour or so, I'm afraid I'll have to dump you," _that one had Sirius covering his mouth in order to hide a chuckle_. "Really, Harry, it's not me, it's you. Comatose blokes just don't do it for me,_" Ginny continued playfully._ "Maybe I'll give McLaggen a try – he's roguishly handsome, after all, and he's tough enough to put the Chosen One drooling in a hospital bed._"

Then, a grumbled response came soon enough. "_I'm not drooling_."

"Well, look at that," Sirius told his wife with a grin. "It worked. He's awake."

Mia sighed but her lips curled too. "Should we give them a little time alone before checking on Harry?"

Sirius nodded as he observed the young couple speaking in hushed tones. He and Mia modestly turned to observe the view out the window when Ginny started leaning towards Harry in a way that indicated a kiss was about to take place.

"You know," Sirius pointed out, "as teachers we should frown upon displays of affection between students, not turn our backs to them…"

Mia turned to him with an eyebrow rose. "As if you'd ever enforce that thought…"

He chuckled. "Sometimes I just get myself thinking of how the heck I – Sirius Black, likely among the top five on the list of the worst troublemakers this school has met – ended up as a teacher. My teenage self would have laughed his head off if he ever thought of it. Sometimes I feel like mocking myself."

"Technically speaking, the Quidditch Coach and Referee isn't a teacher. More like an instructor or something. But I suppose your point concerns working as a member of the school staff. Having McGonagall as a co-worker…"

"I don't think I'll ever get used to that. Half the time I expect her to fetch me into her office and give me one of her lectures. Well, she _did _a couple of months ago…," he mumbled just as they heard Ginny calling for them.

"He's awake," the redhead told them with a smile as they approached.

"So we see," Sirius said with a grin, turning to Harry, who was struggling to move into a sitting position. "I know you're always complaining about Pomfrey's rules on limited visiting hours but getting your skull cracked just to spend more time with your girlfriend? That's dedication."

Ginny nodded, covering her heart with her hand, faking commotion. "He shouldn't have."

"Well, you can thank your 'roguishly handsome' backup boyfriend for it," he told Ginny before turning to face his godmother. "In how much trouble am I?"

"For the fact that you've just taken another decade of life from me with this scare?" Mia asked casually. "I suppose we can lay this one's fault on bad luck and McLaggen alone."

Harry groaned. "As soon as I get myself out of here, I'm going to _kill_ him," he said.

"Not so fast, Harry," Mia warned him. "Poppy wants to keep you here overnight to make sure everything is okay. No overexertion. How does your head feel?"

He groaned. "Feels like an idiot threw a _Bludger_ at it."

"I know the feeling," Sirius offered. "By the way, if you're interested, the final score of the game was three hundred and twenty to sixty. I've heard of worse."

"Brilliant," Harry said through his teeth "Really brilliant! When I get hold of McLaggen…"

"I doubt you'll need to worry about it – the rest of the team wasn't happy. They might've dealt with him already," Ginny told him, unable to hide the hint of sick satisfaction in her tone.

"Oh, he'll be dealt with alright. You can bet your money on that," Sirius murmured under his breath, which had Mia turning to him with a suspicious look on her face.

Her eyes narrowed. "What did you do?"

"Me? Nothing. I swear I didn't," he said, lifting his hands up in a display if innocence. "I was here with you the whole time, wasn't I? I promise I didn't _do_ anything." He might have suggested a few ideas to Ron and the two burly beaters while they were visiting Harry earlier, though… Ideas that involved McLaggen's food being spiked with enough Pucking Pastils to have him leaning over the so-called 'porcelain throne' for quite a while… When he looked back at Mia, he noted the suspicious look was still on – she could see right through him in what came to pranking.

"If McGonagal gets a wind of whatever you did…" Mia started.

"Whatever I did? But I've been here with you all afternoon, love."

"I've known you long enough to be aware that you have your ways," she said

As they spent a several more minutes there, talking to Harry and Ginny, their godson's mood seemed to improve bit by bit, mostly after taking Madam Promfrey's potion that had helped with his headache. Soon after, as Ron, Hermione and Izzy joined them back – bringing news of McLaggens's sudden stomach crisis – they saw it fit to leave the group of friends to talk on their own and left to mind their own business at home.

"Well, another crisis solved and all ends well," Sirius said, throwing the bag that contained his regular clothes into a corner just after he and Mia had flooed into the kitchen. The house was completely empty apart from them and maybe Kreacher, he knew. Alex was spending the day with his young friend Darcy in Wales and little Mary was under the care of Arthur and Molly, who were bound to be spoiling the little girl rotten to make up for their nearly empty nest.

"Yeah, all ends well," Mia mumbled. "Do I want to know how you managed to get McLaggen sick of his stomach without leaving my side? Fred and George's products were involved, no doubt."

"I'm afraid I can't claim anything more than the idea this time around," he said with a grin. "Young minds put it into practice. Don't tell me you don't think he had it coming. The git acted like a smartass and ended up knocking Harry out with a _Bludger on the head_."

She felt tempted to remain quiet but simply couldn't. "Let's hope it teaches him a lesson."

"Let's hope," he repeated, approaching her and resting his hands firmly on her hips. "You look stressed."

"It was quite a fright, Harry getting hurt. Watching it from the stands is worse than from the field, believe me. Anyway, everyone in the Wizarding world is stressed out lately," she replied. "You're stressed too – you just hide it well."

He nodded, knowing there was no use denying it. "Tell you what. Since the house is all ours for the next few hours, how about I go upstairs and run you a bath in that huge tub and we just soak there for a while." He grinned. "See where it leads afterwards."

"We both know where it leads, Sirius," she mumbled, resting her forehead against his shoulder.

He shrugged. "Well, you can't deny that would be a great stress-reliever…"

**A/N: Sorry for the lateness again... My exams have just started and I'm drowing in stuff to do. Also, inspiration was low this week... Anyway, tomorrow I have an interview for a Summer internship - gotta get ready, so wish me luck! Feedback is very welcome. Review!**


	17. Darkest Magic

After the disastrous Gryffindor-Hufflepuff Quidditch game that has led Harry to forcibly keep his girlfriend company in the Hospital Wing for a couple of days, weeks passed incredibly fast.

The two eventless weeks of Easter Break – during which Harry had seemed mysteriously gloomy, though he insisted 'it was nothing' when anyone asked him about the long face – came and gone, ending Mia's maternity leave and, by the time classes were to resume, April was already past its second half. The morning when the first day of classes in Hogwarts's third term was to start dawned with Sirius comfortably dreaming while sleeping in bed.

It was a pretty nice dream though this one didn't involve Mia. How could a dream about Quidditch involve her since she so obviously thought the sport was pointless? He saw himself flying high, surrounded by an enormous Quidditch pitch so full that it might have been the World Cup itself. And his team, well, it was anyone's dream team with, besides himself and James Potter as two of Chasers, the best Quidditch Players in History. Oddly, though, Moony was refereeing, though Sirius didn't remember the Werewolf ever being very interested in the game. _Oh, well, it's a dream,_ he thought since, oddly enough, he seemed to be aware he was dreaming.

Suddenly, he woke up in a shocking and highly unpleasant fashion. He wasn't sure what had caused that. Hurricane? Earthquake? Lightening hitting the house and causing it to fall on him? Maybe the last one was close enough because he could certainly feel something weighing on him and, though that fact might be explained by the fact that his mind was still foggy, it felt like that thing weighed a ton. When he opened his eyes, however, it wasn't rumble that he found all over him but a 27 pound, two-and-something year-old boy instead.

"Geoup, Daddy!" Alex shouted in a giggly tone as he used his beloved stuffed dog to playfully hit his father across the shoulder. "Mowenin!"

Sirius groaned, carefully nudging the little boy off him so he'd stop bouncing on top of his chest and move to the mattress instead. "What did Mommy tell you about jumping on people, mate?" he asked, covering his mouth with his hand to yawn. When the little brat giggled some more, completely unashamed, Sirius mock glared and reached to mess up his hair. "Little monster," he grumbled. Yet, it was just too hard to stay angry at the damn kid despite the rude awakening. It had probably been that little creep Kreacher who'd set the kid loose on purpose so he'd jump on him, anyway.

A glance at Mia's side of the bed let him know she was already up and gone – he groaned. One could call him a cheesy sod but he had a thing for watching her sleep, even if it was for just a couple of minutes. There was something about it – the ease, the purity of it, maybe – that attracted him enough for him to put himself through the effort of waking up earlier than his wife – quite a task since she was a natural early riser – just to watch her for a few minutes, even if he ended up falling back asleep at the end of it. He hadn't been so lucky that time, apparently.

"You wouldn't happen to know where Mummy has gone to, would you?" Sirius asked his son, not expecting any coherent response – there was only so much a two-year-old could say, anyway.

The little boy giggled in reply. "Mama! Kishh Mama mownin, Daddy!"

Sirius couldn't help chuckling. "Wanna give her a good morning kiss? Well, so do I. Tell you what, how about we start a search mission to find Mommy after Daddy's taken a shower?" he asked his son playfully, who nodded surprisingly solemnly – sometimes, this one included, he could swear Alex got a kick out of imitating a small-sized adult. "Alright then," he said, ruffling Alex's hair again before pushing the covers away and getting up, leaving him and the stuffed dog, Snuffles, to play on their own. He headed to the loo just after fetching Kreacher to keep an eye on the toddler while he was in the shower and was done little more than ten minutes later, fully dressed for the day.

The task of going down the stairs took longer than usual since little Alex insisted with a lot of fuss to climb _all_ the way down the stairs to the basement on his own, only holding his father's hand. The little boy, to his father's pride, successfully managed to succeed at it until they reached the first floor and the sweet smell of breakfast downstairs filled his nostrils, causing the young boy to become more interested in his stomach than in showing off, giving in to being carried by his father…

"Now," Sirius told his son before they went down the last flight of stairs leading to the kitchen, "be a pal and let Daddy get a pretty decent kiss from Mummy before you go all cute on her and she forgets about me, okay mate? I'll sneak you an extra cookie as payment."

"Chowat cookie," the little boy said, grinning widely. "Thew yummy."

"Yummy chocolate cookies it is, as long as you keep your side of the deal," he said, offering his hand for the little boy to shake, even though odds were Alex hadn't understood half the 'no cuteness before Daddy gets a French one out of Mummy' deal.

In response, Alex let out a small giggle and mimicked him by muttering the word 'Fwench' while his father placed him back on the floor just outside the kitchen. Then, the little boy ran off to go bother Kreacher.

Looking into the kitchen, he found Mia standing by the table, balancing a fussy Mary in one arm and somehow a cup of tea _and _a quill in the opposite's hand while seemingly reading something from a pile of parchment rolls that remained on the table. He grinned at how… oddly busy she looked – her hair was clumsily pinned up by a clip, several strands escaping from it (one of which their three-month-old daughter was apparently trying to reach up for), and she seemed to be muttering something to herself, though not in a loony person sort of way, while brushing the feather of her quill against her chin.

"_No, no, this won't do. Need a class to review…" _she murmured to herself, putting the cup of tea down and using her quill to scratch something on her parchment and write something else. She was deep in teacher mode, probably kind of jittery about going back after maternity leave.

It made a cute messy view, he thought with a grin before knocking on the open door which had Mia turning around to face him, the busy look all over her face at the same the baby fussed and she rocked her.

"Oh, I was just going upstairs to wake you up but then the I guess got distracted finishing the changes in my class-planning…" she huffed and used her hand to brush a dark strand of hair that had been blocking her view. "Merlin, I probably look like a slo…"

She was unable to finish what she was saying as her husband, walked towards her and, in a sudden movement, pulled her closer, pressing a deep kiss to her lips, which caused her to wonder what she'd been rambling about all that time while parting her lips for him…

It wasn't long before the baby, sandwiched between her parents, began to protest against the lack of attention, as did her energetic older brother by pulling Mia's robes from the floor.

The 'busy look' was gone when they broke apart, replaced by a smile. "I guess I'd forgotten the 'Good Morning' part," she said, reaching to place Mary on her father's arms so she could pay Alex some attention instead.

"What an awful way to greet your beloved husband, woman. I'm afraid it has in a bad way changed my feelings for you forever," he said, half grinning while held the little girl, ticking her bell and causing her to let out a small giggle. "Then again, I suppose the kiss wasn't all that bad and we make fairly decent kids, so no need to end this marriage…"

Mia nudged him on the arm. "Hey!"

"What? Can't a bloke just think out loud?" He turned down to Mary while Mia turned her attention to their little son, who greeted his mother with a squeal and a sloppy kiss on the cheek. "You girls just can't take a joke sometimes," he told Mary in a sing-sung tone.

Unable to respond, Mary just stared up at him with huge brown eyes that mimicked her mother's perfectly and waved her arms around trying to grab the air, which made him laugh while leaning against the kitchen counter with that precious baby in his arms.

"I don't suppose you're worried about this new term for the kids at Hogwarts," Mia said, placing Alex in his high chair.

Sirius shrugged, looking up at her. "Can't be much more dramatic than the previous ones can it? Students cursed, love potions, poison, bludgers smashing heads… how worse can it get?"

"Not much, seen from that perspective," she replied, approaching him and leaning against the counter too. Her head rested against Sirius's shoulders. "Is it awful for me to wish Alex and Mary get pretty boring years at school? Maybe not boring _boring_ but hopefully with no dark lords involved."

"I'd say it would be pretty awful _not_ to wish that," Sirius pointed out, looking down at Mary. "Hopefully Quidditch will be your biggest excitement at school, little girl."

"And dating," Mia added playfully, smiling as his eyes narrowed. "You know, you're just adorable sometimes," she said with a laugh.

"Nope. Not adorable. I'm big, scary and dangerous… or at least that's what I want the guys who dare look at my little Mary to think. No funny business around her."

"Well," she said, "let's hope boys chasing Mary will be the worst of your problems then…"

* * *

_All good so far,_ Mia mused as, later that day, just before she was to leave the school and head home after lunch, she dropped by the library to request a couple of books to prepare a class for the following week.

Madam Pince's desk was empty and it wasn't hard to spot her near a table scolding a bunch of students for making a racket in the library, which led Mia to figure she might as well go look for the books on her own instead of asking for them since the librarian's lectures tended to get long. She chuckled, thinking back to one time in their seventh year when, while she was there in the library studying for her NEWTs, Sirius had pointed out after being scowled by Pince for some reason that the librarian and the caretaker, Filch, had to be a match made in heaven for their 'sparkling personalities'. Sometimes, she couldn't help agreeing though there wasn't any sign of a romance between them.

She headed to the History of Magic section of the library, near the studying tables and quickly rummaged through the books on the shelves of the large bookcase. It was while doing that that Mia recognized her godson's voice, as well as Ron and Hermione's, coming from a table on the other side of the bookcase, which made her lips curl. She'd been intending to go look for them later in order to wish Ron and Hermione good luck for their apparition test and them being right there was just fitting. She was about to drop the book-search for a few minutes in order to go talk to them when she noticed an odd sound, sort of like a buzzing, a static-like noise cutting off the trio's voices momentarily as they spoke every few seconds.

"… _look, I still can't find anything about… not a word about them in the regular sect…"_ she could hear Hermione saying.

It didn't take her long to realize it was a Muffliato charm. It couldn't have been correctly cast, though, or else she wouldn't be able to make out anything Harry, Ron or Hermione said instead of hearing the wireless-with-bad-reception-like conversation.

Suddenly, a question came to her mind. Why were they using Muffliato at all? Appart from her and a couple other students that weren't anywhere near the trio's table, the Library was practically empty. Whatever they were talking about had to awfully important. She wondered if it was about why he'd been so… melancholic and secretive lately.

Mia felt tempted to try and remove the Muffliato spell altogether, which shouldn't be hard since it had been miscast, in order to hear whatever Hermione said in the gaps but her conscience wouldn't let her. Truth was she felt bad enough listening to her godson's private talk even though she couldn't bring herself to stop doing it and walk away.

Hermione kept on talking. _"… keep looking… might find something."_

"_What for?"_ Harry asked. _"You s… the entire library months ago when I first heard of th… didn't find out what… until Slughorn gave the memory…"_

Hermione spoke again. "_I'm trying … Professor Vector into giving me a pass… has to be something in the restrict sect…"_

Mia raised her eyebrows. They were talking about something bad enough to possibly be locked inside the restricted section? More and more, she doubted that was about school work and believed they were taking about the mysterious fact that had Harry worried lately… Unable to resist, Mia moved the books opposite her slightly in order to create a small gap between them that would allow her to see the trio's faces without them noticing. Their expressions were sober, incredibly serious to be seen in kids their age. They looked awfully worried.

"…_think he'll give it to you?" _Ron asked, his expression doubtful.

"_I said… an essay on Arithmancy and Death Predictions… should convince him. Then I can say… scrapped the essay… don't like lying but it's necess…"_

"… _need to find them first! … could be anywhere…"_ Mia heard Harry saying bitterly. _"… can't find where in a book… plus Dumbledore says… not easy to destroy…"_

So it was connected to Dumbledore's lesson, another matter Harry had been making a mystery about, Mia mused.

"_Of course they're not easy…" _Hermione agreed with a nod. "…_not to mention against nature…" _

"_Stabbing it seems simple enough…_" Ron stated._ "Harry did that… worked, right?"_

Hermione shook her head. "_… some theory behind destroying them… lucky he could… without knowing it."_

"…_bledore knows how. He destroyed a Horcrux…_" Harry continued. _"…ring must be what hurt his…_"

"_Killed it, more like," _Ron mumbled.

She couldn't listen or look anymore. What on Earth was going on? Trips to the restricted section (not that that part shocked her all that much), rings that 'killed'… a Horcrux? She'd never even heard of that word before… It had clearly been the main theme of the conversation, though. And how important and dangerous it sounded…

Harry was hiding things from her and Sirius, that was a fact. She'd known it already but she'd hoped he'd just get over it and tell them whatever was going on. Judging by the tone of his conversation with Ron and Hermione, it didn't seem like he intended to do it at all. What was happening in that boy's head? Part of her wanted to just corner Harry and not let him leave until he'd spilled every little detail of what he was hiding but she knew that wasn't a smart thing to do. At least not now… She was angry and far from thinking straight because her head boiled with frustration. Cornering Harry now would only lead to a fight and Merlin knew she didn't have the patience for a fight!

_Teenagers, _she thought with a groan. They always thought they knew everything. And there she'd thought that, despite the fact that trouble always clouded Harry's life, he was rather easy to handle in a teenager sort of way… Not bloody likely if he started hiding stuff from them – stuff that didn't sound trivial at all.

Still standing near the bookcase, she looked through the gap between the books again and saw as the trio abandoned their table and got up, walking towards the library's exit. That part of her that wanted to make Harry spill it all had to fight awfully hard to remain where she was instead of following him.

_First thing,_ she told herself_, is finding out what's going on. _And that involved finding out what the _Horcrux_ thing they'd been so nervously discussing was. Merlin helped her if she didn't find it on her own, she'd go straight to Dumbledore and somehow make him tell her. That was _her son_, after all. He'd been hers ever since the headmaster had handed him to her that Halloween 1981 and she could only back off from his life so much…

With that thought in her mind and her earlier task of finding the History of Magic books forgotten, Mia headed to Madam Pince's desk in order to get the key to the restricted section – she'd start looking right then. There was no time to waste.

* * *

Sirius arrived home later than he'd planned, after having been requested by McGonagall to help out during the apparition tests that afternoon by keeping an eye on the students that were to be tested. Many of them had been showing signs of deep anxiety and that anxiety caused them to act oddly. For instance, he's witnessed his godson's ex… crush, Cho Chang, burst into hysterical tears when she was called in, sobbing and shouting that she couldn't do it – according to Hermione, who'd also seemed quite nervous at the moment, that reaction was due to the fact that it was the third time young Miss Chang took her apparition test, having failed the two previous times. It was more amusing, though, (as well as slightly disgusting) watching Malfoy's crony, Gregory Goyle, successfully apparating from one spot to another with the small problem of having left every single piece of his clothing behind him…

In the end, it had been an interesting afternoon that had brought his mind back to the day when he and the guys had taken their test, passing with no fuss. That was, except from the traitorous bastard Wormtail who'd had three tests before being able to get through it without splinching major body parts and other four before being able to pass at all.

But as soon as Sirius walked out of the floo fire around half past seven in the evening, he knew something had to be wrong for Kreacher to be diplomatically standing by the fireplace, seemingly waiting for him. There were no accusations or whispered insults from either side.

"What?" Sirius asked him.

"Mistress arrive late today. She be upset."

Sirius narrowed his eyes, concerned. "What do you mean by 'upset'?"

"Nervous. Mistress's mother take young masters home with her for rest of day so Mistress wouldn't be disturbed," the house-elf said. "Mistress be in library."

He nodded and walked there without another word. Reaching the ground floor, Sirius didn't even need to enter the library to realize just how upset she was. Through its half open door, he could hear and series of 'damn its' and 'hells', words that she scolded him for saying under normal circumstances. When he finally walked in, his eyes widened. It looked like a hurricane had passed there. There were books everywhere on the floor, piled on chairs, spread all over the tables… If that morning he'd thought her state of disarrange in the kitchen, meddling with rolls of parchment all over the table, had been a 'cute mess', now, looking at his wife sitting cross-legged on the floor furiously flipping the pages of a book, made that notion shift into a 'scary mess'. For a moment, he wondered if she was having some sort of mental breakdown.

"Love…" he said softly. "Please tell me this whole mess isn't over a few classes being behind on the program or something…"

She looked up, her eyes tired. "What?"

"Is this about work, Mia? Because if it is, love, I'd say you're taking it too heavily…"

"It has nothing to do with it," she said, huffing and closing the book with a thump before rubbing her face with her hands. "It's Harry."

"What about him?" Sirius asked, interested, walking towards her and sitting on the floor opposite her.

"He's been hiding stuff from us. Of the serious sort, I mean…" She took a breath before telling him about her run into their godson and his friends in the library and what she'd heard them whispering about.

"So, they're worried about something and researching for a way to destroy these Horcross thingies," he concluded.

"It's Horcrux," she corrected him. "The last part is written as 'cross' in latin. Crux."

"Right. But, well, it could be nothing… You know from experience those three can make a drama out of anything. They're usually right but… sometimes a drama is just, well, a drama."

She sighed. "I considered that but then I went to the Restricted Section of the library to make some research on Horcruxes." Mia reached for a pocket on a side of her robes and removed a folded piece of parchment and handed it to Sirius.

It looked… it looked like it had been ripped from a book. Not just looked – it even had the name of the book printed on the header of it: _Magick Moste Evile_. Sirius looked at his wife in disbelief. "You realize that if Pince finds out you took this from one of her beloved books she'll skin you alive, teacher or not…"

Mia shrugged. "That's very low on my list of priorities. Read this," she said, pointing at a specific sentence.

He did as she said. _'Of the Horcrux, wickedest of magical inventions, we shall not speak nor give direction…' _he silently read in his head. Well, that would explain why she was freaking out. "What's the kid doing messing with dark magic items? Dumbledore destroyed one of these, you said?"

Mia nodded. "That's what I heard them saying. And Ron mentioned something about Harry destroying one too by stabbing it… As if it's not bad enough he's messing with dark items… it just won't add up! If he's already destroyed one, how come he doesn't know how to do it again? Not that I want him to."

"Could have done it by accident the first time," Sirius suggested. "But did you find anything else?"

She shook her head. "Hermione mentioned there wasn't anything in the regular section and nobody does research like her. I even consulted the main inventory book of the library, remissive indexes… nothing. The only mention was in that sentence. Then I figured there might be more here in this library but I found nothing either…"

"Wait but hadn't you moved the darkest stuff my parents owned somewhere else when you moved here?" Sirius asked, recalling a conversation they'd shared shortly after he'd regained his freedom.

"I…" _I'm dumb_, she thought, _I'm so dumb_. She'd been too busy freaking out to remember that little fact. "The attic. I had Kreacher taking them to the attic. I mean, only the books that weren't cursed or that didn't attack people who approached them – the ones who did it went to Dumbledore so he'd handle them in his own way…"

"Well, let's check out those we have, then," Sirius said, motioning to get up and stretching an arm towards his wife to help her up too. "If there's any book in this house where you might find something about the darkest types of magic, it has to be there…"

With a sigh, Mia accepted the help and allowed her husband to pull her up to her feet before they walked out of the library together and up the stairs after talking Kreacher into going with them to show where the books were.

Though Grimmauld Place was their own, they used the two upper floors of their house, not to mention the attic, very rarely. In Mia's case, or the kids' for that matter, it wasn't for any special reason, only because there were so many stairs to climb – Sirius, however, avoided the last floor especially because there had been his and his brother's old rooms and, in Sirius's mind, Regulus was still a sore wound that was to be very rarely touched… When they reached said floor, his eyes averted the dark wooden door that led into his brother's room, a cranky note to stay out written in his handwriting still pined against the door.

The attic was reached through a narrow spiral staircase connected to a trapdoor on the ceiling of the fifth floor and climbing it was a highly uncomfortable task – a task Kreacher avoided by popping straight into the attic. Past the trapdoor the room was dark and dusty enough for the few thin rays of light coming in through a narrow window to illuminate the various particles of dust floating around.

Kreacher led them to what seemed to be a large chest, which he opened with a simple finger-snap. It was completely full. There had to be hundreds of books in there – _we'll never be done with this,_ Sirius thought grimly.

"Well…" he started mumbling. "Where do we start?"

Mia didn't respond – instead, she pointed her wand to the chest. Thankfully, her practical sense didn't seem to be dumbed down by her frustration as her memory did… "_Accio Horcrux books_," she said, causing around a couple dozen books to fly out of the large chest, landing on her feet.

Sirius looked at her, impressed. "I suppose that narrows it down."

"Not so much," Mia told him. "This pretty much summons every single volume with the word 'Horcrux' on it. There's still plenty that won't interest us."

"Well, at least we don't have to go through all of them…"

Yet, it took them only a few minutes to realize that though the summoning might have narrowed the search down, it didn't make it any more pleasant. The books were simply awful, teaching the most cruel curses and potions any of them had ever seen and then detailing every gruesome effect they would cause. Plus, as dark and horrible as they might be, practically every one of them seemed to shy whenever the matter of Horcruxes was mentioned and simply stating how dark and evil they were without explaining why. That only increased their worries…

For every minute that passed, they lost more and more hope of finding any explanation for the apparently tabu word. Asking Dumbledore would be the next step, Mia thought. And if he was reluctant to help them, well, she'd have to convince him one way or the other. Deep down, she felt a slight resentment towards him over the fact that he hadn't told her or Sirius about Horcruxes, whatever they were…

"I found it!" Sirius announced suddenly, gripping a wide, blood-red-covered book in his hands. "This one has the word all over the index. It has to be about it."

"What does it say?" she asked, joining her husband in a quick movement.

"Wait, I'm getting there," he said as he flipped the pages back to the earlier ones. Sirius stopped at the introductory note and gave it a superficial read, looking for anything that said what a Horcrux was. "Here it is. Listen." He cleared his throat and read out loud. "'_Among the darkest and most captivating types of magic that exist in the Wizarding World, the Horcrux is one of the absolute rulers. A Horcrux consists of an object in which a wizard hides piece of his soul, which shall be fragmented by the commitment of the act of murder on another human being, wizard or Muggle. The success of the soul-fragmenting will increase with the rate of malice of such murder either in terms of violence or of intent'._" He paused for a moment, staring wide eyes at the book – part of him wanted to throw it into the fire just as he was done reading. Then, taking a deep breath, he continued. "'_Among the benefits of the creation of a Horcrux are the decrease of weak feelings such as compassion and sense of conscience and…'"_ Sirius stopped reading again and looked Mia in the eyes. "I think I know what this is about. _Who_ this is about."

"Finish it, Sirius," Mia whispered.

He cleared his throat and looked down at the book again. "_'… and, as the most important benefit of all, the concession of absolute immortality to its creator unless the object containing the soul fragment is destroyed beyond repair. As long as a Horcrux subsists, its creator will always have the chance to return to the world of the living…'_"

"It's You-Know-Who," Mia mumbled. "He's done this. He's split his soul and made himself immortal…"

Sirius closed the book and placed it on the floor before they spent several minutes silent. There were just no words to describe how they felt. And not just about the revelation but also about the fact that Harry clearly knew it and hadn't muttered a word about it to them. Never mind that, several times, they'd made him promise to be honest with the… omission was still a form of lying. With a sigh Sirius turned his face to Mia, who seemed to be staring at the wooden floor. "I think we really need to have a talk with Harry."

"Yeah," she mumbled, looking up. "I think we do."

**A/N: Sort of sulking here because my internship interview last week kind of tanked but never mind that... I hope you liked the chapter. It will continue next chapter with their talk to Harry... I really should be studying for my exam tomorrow... Feedback is welcome, as always. Review!**


	18. Conflict

As usual on Wednesdays that year, Harry's first class of the day was History of Magic and, after a whole term without Mia there teaching it, she was back. Her lecture that day, though, sounded rather… off.

Usually, Harry thought, it was the passion she spoke with when telling them about history, her interaction with the students and one or other comparison of complex past events with things right out of their daily routine that got the class interested. That day… well, she sounded like a recording of someone reading an incredibly plain textbook. Was she that out of shape after only a few months not working as a teacher?

"What's going on with Mia today?" Ron whispered by his side, his head propelled on his arm in a bored fashion that matched the vague look on his face. "She's sounding like bloody Binns now."

"Shut up and listen, Ron," Hermione demanded on Harry's other side, carefully taking notes of Mia's words in her parchment – something in her seemed to bide her immune to Mia's boring lecture that day.

"What? She is," the redhead replied, peeking behind his best mate's back to look at her.

Hermione sighed, allowing herself not to pay attention for a moment. "She sounds upset, even looks so," she said, turning to Harry. "Do you know if something happened?"

He shook his head. "Maybe she's just tired. I suppose Mary may be keeping her and Sirius awake lately. Aren't babies supposed to be teething at her age?"

"That usually doesn't happen before they turn six months old. She's not even four yet," Hermione said, doubtfully.

Ron raised an eyebrow. "Do you know _everything_?"

"It's called reading, Ronald. You should try it sometime. Now pay attention. This may come in the exam and I'm not lending you two my notes this time…"

Despite his earlier dismissal of it, Harry spent the following minutes wondering if Hermione was right regarding Mia being upset about something… later, he concluded she was. As he paid closer attention to the dull sound of her voice, he noted a tone of anxiety behind it. It was hardly noticeable and he certainly wouldn't have identified it if he hadn't known his godmother for so long…

He hoped there hadn't been an attack and someone had gotten hurt… Or that Alex or Mary weren't ill or something. Those would be more and more things piling over Mia's shoulders, as if there weren't enough already. That thought rather eased that internal battle he'd been struggling with for the past couple of weeks over keeping or not things – important things – from his godparents. He just couldn't add up more to that weight…

For the rest of the class, Harry tried to pay attention to Mia's words, taking a few notes so as not to anger Hermione, who elbowed him whenever he got an absent look on his face (and also to have some backup plan in case his friend really kept her promise of not letting him and Ron borrow her notes).

By the time the class had already ended and most of the students were making their ways out the door, heading to the next one, Harry heard his name being called as he, Ron and Hermione finished putting away their things to follow. When he looked up, Mia, who'd been the source of the call, was standing near her desk looked at him with slightly uncertain eyes. It was like she was fighting her feelings right then.

"Would you mind staying a few minutes longer?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah, sure," he said quickly, turning to his friends for a moment. "You guys go ahead to next class without me. I'll meet you there."

They nodded. "I'll inform Professor McGonagall you're talking to Mia," Hermione said as she and Ron grabbed their bags and headed out.

With his two friends gone, Harry grabbed his own bag and approached his godmother, feeling rather uncertain of what might be about to take place. Why did he have such a bad feeling about it? "Did you need something, aunt Mia?" he asked nervously.

"I do, actually," she said in a low tone, followed by a sigh. "Sirius and I need to talk to you. I'm not sure if you have any free time before I'm supposed to leave in the afternoon but I can…"

"I've got a free period right after lunch. At half past one," he told her quickly.

She nodded. "Alright. That will do. Meet us at your godfather's office then. We can talk there."

Her tone was so… disconnected. More and more he believed she was trying to shadow what she was feeling. "Is there something wrong?" he finally asked.

Another sigh came. "You tell me, Harry. It seems lately you haven't been telling me many things," she said in a low tone before taking a deep breath. "There wasn't an attack and nobody was physically hurt, if that's what you're wondering. We just need to talk to you."

"Okay," he mumbled, an uneasy feeling still resting inside his chest. It clicked, then: she knew he was hiding something, Harry realized. He'd been hoping it wouldn't reach that – he'd been hoping his godparents would either be too busy to notice he was being secretive or that they would just let him be and not corner him about it. He didn't want to lie to them but he didn't want to tell the truth either…

A knock on the class's door made him resurface from his thoughts and Mia turned to look at it as well. Colin Creevy was standing by the door. "Oh, come on in, Colin," she said, before facing Harry again. "We'll talk later."

He nodded. "Later, then," he mumbled again, turning and heading to the door as several fifth year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws made their way in – Luna Lovegood, among the students, greeted him happily as she walked in. He was still thinking of what to tell Sirius and Mia later in their talk when he very literally ran into a blur of red, leading into a loud crash of books all over the floor. It took him a few fractions of second to realize the blur was Ginny, who stood opposite him with Izzy.

"Well, aren't you clumsy today?" his girlfriend with an eyebrow rose before reaching down to pick up the school books she'd been carrying.

"Sorry," he apologized, reaching down as well.

"What are you still doing here?" Izzy inquired with a chuckle. "I saw Ron and Hermione rushing to McGonagall's class like five minute ago."

"Oh, I was held back for a while talking to your Mom," he said quickly, before shooting Ginny a pointed look, which she replied with a knowing one – he didn't even need to utter a word in order to tell he needed to talk to her alone.

Ginny cleared her throat. "Iz, can you go in and save us some seats at the front before they're all taken?" she asked her friend. "I'll meet you there right away."

"You know, if you guys want me out of here so you can snog, just say so," Izzy said, shaking her head as she turned to walk away and entered her mother's classroom.

"What's wrong?" Ginny asked in a whisper as the two leaned down, picking up her books from the floor.

Harry turned his face to face hers. "It's Mia. She knows."

"About the…" she paused, noticing a group of her classmates passing by "…you-know-whats?

"I dunno – about something, at least. She knows I'm keeping things for her and Sirius. She asked me to go talk to them later today," he informed Ginny.

She took a deep breath. "Well, I'm not going to say I told you so…"

"You might as well," he mumbled.

"… but it was awfully stupid of you not to tell them right away," the redhead finished.

A moment of mutual silence followed, during which Harry was torn between agreeing with her and convincing himself he'd done the right thing. "What do I tell them if they ask about it?" he asked while the two motioned to stand up.

There was a momentary flicker of irritation on Ginny's face and, before Harry could react, she was slapping him on the back of the head with her free hand. "The truth, you idiot!" she told him firmly. "They've helped you through… _everything_, Harry. They've always been honest with you – the least you could do was be honest to them too. Honestly, I don't get why didn't tell them about the Hor…" she paused again, "oh, the you-know-whats from the beginning."

"They have enough to worry about," Harry told her.

"Well, I don't think they'd agree. If my Mom found out I'd been hiding something like that from her, she'd keep me grounded until I was old enough to walk with a cane no matter what the reason was," Ginny told him seriously. "Lucky for you, Sirius and Mia usually aren't as strict about grounding as Mom is."

He sighed, her point getting stronger in his mind. "Well, you'd wait for me if they did ground me that badly, wouldn't you?" he asked as he handed her the books he'd picked up, trying to cheer himself up a little.

Ginny snorted. "Of course I wouldn't." She took one step further and kissed his cheek softly. "You know how to do the right thing. And try not to get grounded – it's bad enough you keep getting yourself detentions." Then, she walked away and entered Mia's classroom, leaving him standing alone in the hallway.

He hoped she was right and he'd really do the right thing. Or else he might dig himself a much larger hole…

* * *

"I just wanted to grab him by the shoulders and ask him what the hell he thought he was doing by not telling us You-know-who had shattered his soul to pieces and gotten himself immortal!" Mia told her husband later that day around lunch time while standing inside his office, pacing with her arms crossed against her chest.

"Well, you didn't, did you?" Sirius asked her, raising an eyebrow from the sofa where he sat.

She let out a huff and uncrossed her arms. "No, but it took all the self-control I had for me not to. And I didn't want to cause a scene in front of half the sixth-years…" she replied, using her hands to rub her face. What she'd give for a single hour of rest without a single worry.

Sirius stretched an arm towards her. "Come here," he told her, seeing she could probably use a little support right then.

She didn't even bother trying to refuse – instead, she pushed her chair back from the desk and got up, walking towards her husband's waiting arms and curling against his side on the sofa. Feeling his arms around her soothed her in a way that nothing else could – the short couple of hours she'd managed to sleep in the previous night had only happened due to the fact that he'd been there holding her…

"Why would he keep this a secret from us?" she asked in a whisper. "Why would _Dumbledore_ keep this a secret? We're his godparents – Harry is our responsibility. We had a right to know."

Sirius nodded. That part was bothering him as well. "We'll deal with Dumbledore after we talk to Harry, Mia. Don't worry about him now."

She sighed and nodded, taking a few moments just to close her eyes and lean against him, hoping that would ease the tension she had in her body. Then, minutes later as she felt slightly better, she took a deep breath and pulled away a little to look up at her husband. "You're taking this awfully calmly," Mia observed.

He sighed – he might appear calm but we wasn't all that great either… who would be, faced with the fact that an incredibly hard task such as Harry defeating Voldemort had just gotten even harder? But someone had to stay strong and that time that was his task. "No, I'm worried too," he admitted to her, running a hand down her hair. "I'm just trying not to freak out before I know everything – and to see the, well, positive part of this."

"There is a positive part?" Mia replied sceptically.

"Well, just because You-Know-Who has a bunch of backup soul fragments, it doesn't mean he is _immortal_, does it? I mean, if we keep on getting rid of the Horcruxes, one of two things will happen: either he'll run out of them at some point and Harry will be able to wipe him out or he'll just keep making more of them and eventually end up destroying himself in theory by doing it. We all know that people who get their souls sucked out by Dementors become vegetables – it can't be all that different for people who shatter it so much they end up with just one percent of it inside them," Sirius explained to her simply, though he knew that it could be years, decades, before any of those options became part of reality… that part, he'd just keep to himself. "As for the kid, until I hear otherwise coming from his mouth, I just can't believe he didn't have a good reason to keep it from us at least in his head. And you know why?"

"Why?" she asked.

"Because he loves you and he's more… noble than a kid his age should worry about being – he wouldn't lie to you if he didn't think it was necessary or he wasn't desperate enough to do it," Sirius explained.

She shifted her body in order to get herself lounging along the sofa with her legs resting on his lap. "I hope you're right on both accounts."

"That makes two of us," he replied softly. "Do you want to go grab something to eat before Harry gets here? We can just go to the kitchens and charm the elves into making us a sandwich."

Mia shook her head. "I'm not hungry now – I'll eat something afterwards when we get home," she stated. Food was the farthest thing from her mind right then. "You can go if you want to, though."

"Nope, I'll stay," Sirius told her, rubbing his hands softly on her legs.

With a sigh, she leaned her head against the back of the sofa, intending to just close her eyes for a moment and rest a little. The next thing she knew, she was awoken by the knock on the door and felt Sirius tugging her legs away from his lap. Her eyes opened to see him putting down a Quidditch magazine she didn't recall him having when she'd closed her eyes earlier and getting up. Clearly, she'd been snoozing for a while: ten minutes? Twenty? She couldn't really tell.

Figuring the visitor was likely Harry, she got up as well and stood behind Sirius looking at the door. He looked awfully nervous, Mia noted as he came in. Nervous and… guilty. Somehow, that last part made her feel slightly better.

"Take a seat, kid," Sirius told him in a calm, neutral tone. Mia had to give him credit for being able to sound so unruffled when she'd barely been able to keep her cool a few hours before when she'd spoken to Harry.

"Alright," their godson responded, sitting down on the sofa she and Sirius had occupied minutes before. "So…" he started awkwardly, noting that Sirius seemed to be currently casting an imperturbable charm around the office, "what did you want to talk to me about?"

"We know about the Horcruxes," Mia heard herself blurting out – well, seemed like the conversation was going to start by there. "We know what they are and we know You-Know-Who made more than one to make himself immortal."

Harry looked at her, half shocked, half regretful. He'd been expecting them to know only that he was hiding something from them, not to know _what_ – that only made him feel worse and realize that he was in even more trouble than he'd imagined. Harry hadn't wanted them to know about the Horcruxes but if they had to find out somehow, he'd hoped it would have been by him telling them…

"Why didn't you tell us, Harry?" his godmother asked, then. "We had an agreement, remember? We made it during the Summer before your fifth year: we would be honest to you about the order if you were honest to us about whatever you found out. Why didn't you tell us about this or about Dumbledore's lessons for that matter?"

She sounded hurt and disappointed and that made him feel even more awful than her words did – how odd was it that the agreement hadn't even crossed his mind during those weeks he'd spent keeping the truth from his godparents?

"Because… I mean…" he stammered at first. "Because I didn't feel like there was anything to tell at first. In the beginning all I was learning was Occlumency and about Voldemort's life before he became… what he is now."

"Learning about him? How?" Sirius asked, seemingly interested.

"Pensieve memories," Harry explained. "From Dumbledore and other people. It was just memories of Voldemort's parents and him as a kid, during his Hogwarts years and shortly after. The only point of them was for me to know who I was fighting and it didn't seem… essential to tell you all about them. You had more important things to worry about than his biography."

"We wouldn't be having this conversation if it just involved a biography, Harry," Mia stated. "When exactly did you learn about the Horcruxes? And how?"

He sighed, knowing his answer would make her. "I first heard about Horcruxes last February…"

"February?" she shouted, getting up in a jump. "February? As in two months ago, Harry?"

"I…"

"You knew about them for two months and it didn't occur to you that they might be something worth telling us about?" she insisted in disbelief.

"Mia, let the kid explain," Sirius told his wife quietly, approaching her to rest a hand on her shoulder, silently telling her to sit back down.

Still looking frustrated and now getting close to furious, she gave in, crossing her arms against her chest in a temper. "Fine," she mumbled.

"Okay," her husband muttered, turning to Harry. "Why didn't you tell us about it then, Harry?"

"Because it was just a word back then," he told them. "I first heard it in a memory. Voldemort – he was still Tom Riddle back then – was talking to a teacher and suddenly, he asked him about Horcruxes: he seemed to be awfully interested in them even though he couldn't be more than sixteen at the time. But when it seemed like the teacher was about to answer, he sent Riddle away in a really odd way and I ended up not knowing what they were. Dumbledore told me the end of the memory sounded so odd because it had been tempered with. Hermione looked all over the library, trying to find out what Horcruxes were but she couldn't find anything there."

"You should have asked us, then," Mia said, exasperated. "We might know and if we didn't, we'd try to find out!"

"I… I didn't want to bother you with that," he replied – that was the point of the whole thing, wasn't it? "Besides, I had another way. After we saw that memory, Dumbledore gave me a mission: I was supposed to convince S…" he paused, recalling Slughorn had asked him for secrecy on that "…the teacher who'd tempered with the memory to give the real one to me so we could know what had really come out of that conversation. It was pretty clear he'd told Riddle whatever a Horcrux was, so if I got the memory, I'd find out too. It took me a while but I managed to get then real memory a couple of weeks ago."

"Right before the Easter Break, I gather," Sirius observed, still sounding neutral as he stood against his desk, right behind Mia, who looked more and more frustrated. "And I suppose you were right about it explaining all about Horcruxes – that would explain your gloominess during the whole break."

"Yes," Harry replied with a faint nod, followed by a moment of silence.

"Do you know how many he made?" Mia asked at some point.

He was about to ask in return how she even knew Voldemort had made more than one Horcrux but quickly gave up on it – he was in enough trouble as it was. He guessed that now that they knew everything, there was no use hiding the number, then. "Six, according to Dumbledore. He would have split his soul in seven parts, one of which is still in his body – Dumbledore first figured he'd done it when I gave him the diary."

"The diary?" Sirius asked. "You mean the one that possessed Ginny in your second year? That was a Horcrux?" _Dumbledore knew about this all that time?_ He thought.

Harry nodded. "Yes, I destroyed that one and Dumbledore destroyed another: a ring that had belonged to Voldemort's grandfather. That's probably what damaged his hand."

"So there are four left," Mia concluded. "They could be _anything_. Be anywhere. It will be like finding a needle in a haystack!"

"We… Dumbledore and I suspect what some may be through what we saw in the pensieve memories," Harry told her in a quiet tone. "There were a cup and a locket – they were supposed to have belonged to Helga Hufflepuff and Salazar Slytherin – that Riddle seemed awfully interested in. We suppose they may have been turned into horcruxes because their owner mysteriously died soon after he saw them. And then there's also the snake…"

"The one that bit Arthur?" Sirius inquired, receiving a nod in return. "Merlin. I didn't even know one could turn living beings into Horcruxes…"

"See? It wasn't so hard to tell us this," Mia said, getting up. "Why didn't you do it right away? Didn't you think we could keep it a secret?"

"Of course I thought you could," Harry replied without hesitation. "I just thought it was for the best. I didn't want you to have to worry about…"

"We _should _worry about it, Harry!" she shouted back – his logic just didn't make sense in her mind. Likely it was because it was clouded by the ever growing frustration and worry that filled her. "We're responsible for you! You're our family! Good or bad we want to know what is going on with your life and we want to help you with it! What made you think it would be better hiding something that important from us? "

"I don't know!" he replied, also frustrated. "I get that you are supposed to worry but not like _this_. Not all the time. Sometimes I just get myself thinking that life would have been a lot easier for you without me in it, Aunt Mia."

The silence that followed that statement was suffocating. At some point, Sirius had seen himself retreating to the sidelines as the argument shifted between Harry and Mia. Now, his wife just stared, her mouth half hanging open as she looked at their godson. He knew by the look on her face that she had no idea what to say, so the only word that she managed to utter in a chilling whisper was predictable enough.

"What?"

"It's true!" Harry said, standing up too – he could feel all those moments over the years when he'd caused trouble piling over him and ready to come out. "How many times have you ended up sitting by my bedside in the Hospital wing because I got myself there for a reason or another? How many times did you have to worry because Voldemort or the Death Eaters wanted me dead? You're right in the middle of this war because they're all after me and if it wasn't for me, you all could be far away from here! Safe!"

Mia stared some more before her voice came out again, cold and sharp as an icicle. "Are you out of your mind, Harry? You think you're a _burden_ to us?"

Suddenly, Harry couldn't respond. He could see that simple statement had affected her more than him not having told her about the Horcruxes.

"Do you?" she insisted.

"Sometimes," he admitted.

"Well, you're _not_!" she said, furious at his admission. "You're not _now_, you _never_ were and you _never_ will be. You're _my son_ and the day that turns you into a burden is the day when this world stops being worth living in as far as I'm concerned! _How can you possibly _think_ that?_" By the time she yelled that last part, her eyes burned as tears of fury wanted to come out but she wouldn't let them.

"I…" he mumbled.

"Did it ever occur to you that the very thought of you being a burden crossing your head is insulting to me? To us? Did it ever occur to you that we don't care about how much trouble lands on you because we'll always love you despite it? That even if one day you got yourself in a mess even more terrible and life-threatening than all the ones you've already been in together we'd still love you and wouldn't stop at anything to get you out of it?"

She might as well have punched him or slapped him or maybe given him that decade-long grounding Ginny had mentioned earlier when they'd met. It wouldn't have made him feel worse than that. He'd always known Mia loved him like a son – he just hadn't realized how deeply that feeling went. He couldn't even find his voice to apologize!

She lifted a hand and pointed at him – her eyes might as well have been as incandescent as burning lava, so angry she looked right then. "If you ever _dare_ thinking like that again, Harry James Potter, I… I will…" But she couldn't bring herself to finish speaking. Instead, she turned on her heel, headed to the door and walked out after opening it. Then, she closed it with such force that not only did Harry think he heard the wood of the sturdy door crack but also he could swear he felt the millennia-old castle tremble under his feet.

His heart thumped so fast he thought it might explode and for a moment he wondered if his face was on fire because he could certainly feel it burning. He'd never seen his godmother that angry in his near seventeen years of life. Not at him, not at Izzy, not at anyone. Until then, he hadn't even believed she was capable of it…

When he turned to face Sirius, his godfather didn't look all that surprised – instead he seemed almost… comprehensive about it though he clearly wasn't all that happy either.

"Well, kid, I suppose now it's our turn to talk," he said calmly.

**A/N: To be continued...**

**Well, I hope you liked this chapter - I won't even bother about complaining about writing instead of studying when I have an exam tomorrow because, let's face it, I can't help it... Anyway, I felt inspired this week - furious!Mia is surprisingly nice to write. Feedback if very welcome here. Review!**


	19. Blameless

"Well, kid, I suppose now it's our turn to talk," Sirius said calmly as he leaned back against his desk, seconds after his wife stormed out of his office angrily.

He couldn't blame her at all for it… the look on her face had certainly shown that she needed time on her own to let out the steam. If Mia had stayed there a little longer, she could have yelled until her vocal cords snapped – she might not usually be the screaming type but she certainly had been angry enough to open an exception that one time.

Harry still looked shocked as he sat back down on the couch. "I… I… she's pissed."

"Worse. She's livid," Sirius pointed out. "And she's not easy to piss off, kid. I can count with the fingers of one hand how many times she looked that angry, a couple of which were caused by Umbridge." He uncrossed his arms and sat on the chair Mia had occupied before. He wasn't intending to give him one of those patronizing speeches, just a little heart-to-heart with banter put aside. "A burden? What's gotten into your head to say that, kid?"

"I don't know…" he mumbled, still confused. "Maybe I shouldn't have said it to Aunt Mia but it's not entirely false is it?" he asked, trying to justify himself. "I mean, from time to time I get myself thinking that if you weren't responsible for me, you wouldn't have been dragged into this mess. You could be living your lives far away from this war…"

"No, we _couldn't_," he said firmly, making Harry look up to face him – his expression seemed very determined… "Look, I'm not going to bother telling you that you didn't drag us into this mess because you should already know that, Harry. But you know I'm going to tell you instead? That even if Lily and James were alive, Mia and I would still have made a point of dragging ourselves into this mess instead of running away for some safe destination. Because even if you weren't ours, you'd still be family and we'd still fight for you. That's what we do, kid, so get your mind out of the gutter. _Family_ is not a burden."

"Yours was," Harry pointed out without thinking. "I mean your parents," he amended quickly. "The way you talk about them – it's like you wish you'd never met them."

"Right in all but one accounts," Sirius offered him with a dry chuckle. "They might be my parents but they weren't my family. My real family were the Potters: your grandparents, your dad… even your Mom after they got married and Moony as well." Wormtail too before he'd betrayed them all, he thought for a moment before continuing. "They were the ones that I picked, just as we picked you even before your parents died – no matter how much trouble you cause, that's not going to change. So stop thinking of the what-ifs involving you not being in our lives – you can sit right there for years imagining different scenarios and, guess what? That's not going to change anything and even if it could, we wouldn't want to. Just… tell me what this sudden guilt is about."

"It's not… sudden. It's been building up for a while, I guess," Harry explained, twisting his hands on his lap nervously as he looked down. "You know before you came back? When Izzy and I were kids and we lived in Montreal?" Harry asked his godfather, who nodded. "We could see there was something really sad about Aunt Mia back then – she smiled a lot when she was with us but it rarely really reached her eyes. Eventually, Lulu told us it was because you weren't there with her. She missed you."

"Izzy told me about that already," Sirius admitted stiffly – he didn't like thinking of that time.

Harry continued. "I always thought that when you came back that… that shadow in her eyes would disappear. And it did, for a while," he added quickly. "After you guys got married and Aunt Mia found out she was having Alex, she was just… so happy. The way she was supposed to be. But then it all came back: the Death Eater attack during the World Cup, the Triwizard Tournament, Voldemort returning, the ministry against me, Umbridge… then there was a shadow again – you being around helped her deal with it a lot but now there is just so much piling up… She's stressed because of me over and over again and it's not _fair_ to her. My point is that after all Aunt Mia's done for me: raising me, giving up her life in Montreal so I could come to Hogwarts, always being available to help… she _deserves_ to be happy and without a care and sometimes it's like the only thing between her and that is me."

There was a short moment of silence between them. So keeping the Horcruxes from them had been more about Mia than about both of them. It was understandable, he mused. Mia had raised Harry since he was a baby – he was bound to feel a stronger parental bond with Mia than with him and that made him more protective of her. Being Sirius himself protective of her, he couldn't fully blame the kid for it…

Yet some things needed to be said and when Sirius spoke up, his tone was more sincere and sombre than Harry had ever heard it. "Well, I'm sorry to break the news to you, Harry, but with or without war, happy lives without a care are a myth. Sure, sometimes you have fewer things to worry about than others but there is always _something_ to bug us. All in all, I'd say Mia is as happy as one can be under the circumstances and you have something to do with it: for instance, you said me being here helped. Do you know what I would be if you weren't in our lives? Nothing. I'd be an empty shell of a person with no soul in one of Azkaban deepest cells. Don't think I forgot you were the one who helped me escape Flitwick's office when the Dementors were coming for me and then testified to set me free. You're far from on the way of her happiness, you're part of it, actually."

Harry didn't respond to that, remaining silent and looking down instead. He didn't know what to say, actually. Somehow in his mind all bad things that he blamed on himself seemed to overshadow the good ones until someone mentioned them.

Sirius continued, then. "So, you really didn't say anything about the Horcruxes because you didn't want to add up her stress even more, hum?" Sirius concluded and Harry nodded silently. "You didn't have to deal with all of that on your own, you know? You might not tell Mia but you could have told me. Believe me, after a decade in Azkaban, one is able to deal with pretty much anything," Sirius said dryly. Sure, he would have been in quite a pickle if Harry asked him to keep something that important from Mia but he was sure he could figure something out …

Harry shook his head immediately, his thoughts mirroring his godfather's. "No, I couldn't do that, Sirius. Then you'd have to chose between keeping the secret for me or telling Aunt Mia," he said. "That's why I didn't tell Izzy either – I either had to tell the three of you or none. I thought it would be better if I told none…"

"… and now it came back to bite you in the arse," Sirius finished for him. "You know, that's the problem with lies and omissions – they often come back to give you grief. Better stick with the truth, especially when it comes to people you care about. I learned that the hard way."

His godson looked at him curiously, waiting for a further explanation. "Are you going to tell me how you did?"

Sirius groaned internally. There was a reason why he and Mia had never mentioned their big fight to Izzy or Harry: they hated remembering it, let alone mentioning it. But he supposed telling Harry would be a good step towards an understanding. "Last year I did something very stupid and it hurt Mia a lot."

"What?"

He stood up, not feeling like remaining sat and walked to stand against the stone wall of the office. "Let me start from the beginning. We'd caught one of You-Know-Who's pals and I was in charge of watching him before we handed him to the Dementors – the bastard had a big mouth and just wouldn't shut up. He was provoking me and ended up telling me, among other things, where Wormtail supposedly was." He purposely avoided saying the rest Rodolphus had said – there were some things Harry just didn't have to know.

"Why would he tell you that?" Harry asked immediately.

"Most likely because it was a trap, though I'm pretty sure Wormtail isn't much loved among the death eater community," Sirius explained quickly. "The fact is that I wanted to go after him even though it sounded like a trap and Mia didn't want to let me go and asked me to promise I wouldn't. So," he said, swallowing hard – that was the hardest part to admit, "I looked her in the eyes and I made the promise."

"But you still went after him," Harry guessed easily.

"Yeah. It really was a trap, obviously, and not only Wormtail wasn't there but also I was pretty close to not being able escape it. When I got back home, Mia didn't yell or cry – she just turned at me and I could see she looked so… broken. Disappointed. It felt worse than it would if she'd cursed me. We spent a whole week walking on eggshells after that, barely speaking to each other."

"When exactly did this happen?" his godson inquired. He just couldn't remember them ever being like that…

"Exactly a week before the battle at the Department of Mysteries," Sirius told him. "We hadn't made up yet by the time it happened. I don't think I need to tell you how… terrified I was of losing her, let alone of losing her before I had a chance to beg her for forgiveness – she eventually did, though. The point of me telling you this is to show you that we all make mistakes. Huge ones. The good thing about mistakes is that we get to learn from them. After that, I promised myself that I would never lie to her like that again. I hope you learn something similar from this."

"So, you're not… angry at me for not telling you about the Horcruxes?" Harry asked him tentatively.

"Try disappointed that you didn't give us a little more credit, kid," Sirius stated with a sigh. "But next time you discover something this important, we'd better find out about it from you, Harry. Believe it or not, Mia can handle a lot more than you can imagine – yes, the Horcruxes would have scared her at first and made her even more worried about you but she'd deal with it and she'd be fine. She's a lot stronger than you think."

Harry sighed. "She's really hurt now, isn't she? I thought I was doing the right thing for her. For all of you. But I guess Aunt Mia was right. She has the right to be upset. Especially when I said that about…her life being easier without me there… For all that's worth, I'm really sorry I did it – I didn't mean to hurt her."

"I know you didn't," his godfather assured him. "And just for the record, she was right: you being a burden to us could only happen if this world was an uninhabitable mess of a place, so don't even let that thought cross your mind again. It's a waste of brain cells."

"I won't," he promised and was surprised when realizing that, this time, he meant it. "I should… probably go apologize to her, shouldn't I?" he asked, unsure. He didn't feel all that ready to face her… He turned to his godfather, hoping for an answer. "Do you think I should do it right now?"

Sirius shook his head. "Knowing Mia, you might want to give her a little time to process the fight before trying to apologize or else you're risking a second round of yelling. At least wait until tomorrow, okay? In the meantime you can talk to your friends and Ginny if want other opinions on this."

Harry huffed, annoyed with himself. "Ginny's been telling me for the past two weeks that I should tell you about the Horcruxes," he said. "She told me that if you found out in some other way you'd be upset. I should have listened to her – she's usually right."

"Well, she always seemed like a smart girl to me," Sirius pointed out before managing to offer him a smirk. "You'd better marry her one day or I'm fixing up Alex with her when he's bigger. He can handle an older woman."

Harry couldn't help chuckling. "I'll take that under consideration." Suddenly, he felt tempted to ask Sirius something he'd been wondering about ever since Mia had told him they knew about the Horcruxes. "Can I ask how you guys found about the…?"

"She heard you, Ron and Hermione speaking about it in the library yesterday afternoon," Sirius responded before he could finish.

"In the library?" he asked, confused. "But we'd cast a muffliato charm all around us. I mean, I remember Ron doing it."

"Not very well, apparently – he probably should give a thought to training the spell before using it again," Sirius pointed out. "Anyway, Mia was able to hear pieces of what you were saying through the static of the Muffliato and figured it out." He left out the existence of the book about Horcruxes in Grimmauld Place, knowing Harry would want it – he still wanted to research a little more before handing it to his godson. "So… what are you planning to do about them?"

"Find them and then destroy them," Harry told him flatly. "It's the only way to end Voldemort. Dumbledore promised he would let me help him destroy the next one he found."

_Did he?_ Sirius thought dryly. The headmaster was another loose end in that argument… "If you need help, Harry, you know you can count on us. And I'm not just offering help so you'll know it's available – I'm offering it so you'll _use _it. I hope you don't forget your promise of mutual communication again."

"I won't. I promise I won't," Harry said. "I'm _really _sorry I didn't think of it before, Sirius. I…" he glanced at the clock on the wall of Sirius's office. "…I've got a DADA class in five minutes."

"Well, we wouldn't want to get Snivellus worked up because you're late, would we?" Sirius said with a groan. "Just do me a favour first. Do you have the map on you? I needed to borrow it for a while – I'll give it back tomorrow, okay?" He imagined that might save him some time of walking around the castle searching for his wife. Merlin knew where she could be after having stormed out the way she had.

Harry nodded, reaching for the pocket of his robes and removing the neatly folded piece of battered parchment, which he handed to Sirius. "You're going to meet Mia, aren't you?" he asked, receiving a nod in return. "Can you tell her I'm sorry? I mean," he added quickly, "not tell her I asked you to tell her – just… please let her know that I'm sorry…"

"Don't worry about it, kid," Sirius told him, understandingly. "Now get your arse out of here and go to class before Snape takes a turn at yelling at you too."

"I'm going," Harry said, reaching for his bag of books and standing up before he headed to the door. Then, just as he opened it, he turned around to face Sirius. "Thanks. For this talk. It helped," he said. And then, he was gone, closing the door behind him.

Sirius sighed when he saw himself alone. That had been some talk: he didn't even know where he should start analyzing it. Oh, well, maybe he should just leave the analysis for later… or give up on it altogether. Now, what he needed to do was finding Mia and deal with her.

He looked down at the yet blank map on his hand. "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." It was strange how easily the words rolled off his tongue even though he hadn't said them in such a long time – in fact, he realized, the last time he had used the map had been when Filch had confiscated it from him and James in the last week of classes in his seventh year. Just as the thought crossed his mind, he felt sort of a pang in his heart and instinctively looked over his shoulder – part of him expected all the guys to be there, ready to cause some mischief. But that wasn't the case. It would never be again with one of them dead and another being a traitor. He shook his head, ordering himself to stop thinking of it – he should just think of searching for Mia now.

Finding her dot revealed itself to be a handful of a task – in some areas of the map there were just so many moving dots and so many names jumbled together that it was hard to tell which was which. To get a wider view of the place, he ended up spreading the whole map open over the mess on his desk, which consisted of an assortment of Quidditch magazines and catalogues, parchment, quills and Merlin knew what else. As he studied the map, he soon realized his wife wasn't in the places he'd expected the most: either locked in her office or in Dumbledore's giving him grief for having kept the Horcruxes from them – then again, the headmaster wasn't there either…

Where else could she be? He wondered. She wouldn't have just headed home without saying anything, would she? He spent several more minutes searching through the jumbled dots in the map, spotting Izzy's in the Gryffindor Common Room and in the DADA classroom, before deciding to use logics. Where would he go if he was upset and wanted a moment alone? Likely some secret passageway where nobody could find him. Mia didn't know the castle that well, though, so he marked that as unlikely. Astronomy tower? No, only the dots of a couple of students were there, probably snogging. Some empty classroom? There were dozens of them and he just didn't have the time to check them all, so he skipped to the next possibility. Kitchens? Nothing but house-elves' names there. Suddenly, he felt dumb. The lake. Of course that was where she'd gone, he realized even before he even spotted her dot by the margin of it – the lake had always been sort of a special place for them. A calm place to think.

"Mischief managed," he murmured, clearing the parchment of all signs of a map in it. He folded it back, shoving it in his pocket and then he headed out of his office, aiming for the lake.

* * *

Mia realized she probably looked like a madwoman to anyone who would see her right then: she was pacing left and right in a hurried pace, which made it seem like she kept heading somewhere and suddenly changing her mind, her hair was probably a mess because she couldn't help running her hands through it in irritation and her eyes were red and swollen from those furious tears that insisted on running down her face. In fact, she was so sure she looked like a madwoman that she had not only picked one of the most secluded spots by the side of the Hogwarts's lake but also cast disillusionment charm around her so, in case a student of hers happened to stumble upon her sorry self, he or she wouldn't lose all the respect for the mad History of Magic teacher.

Her mind kept darting between the two big issues that were bothering her: the Horcrux situation and Harry thinking he was a burden. A _burden_! Simply thinking of it made her jaw clench even harder and the tears fall more furiously. How was it possible that he thought _that_?

Just then, she heard the sound of footsteps approaching her and looked in the direction of them only to see her husband emerging from the bushes, holding a large piece of parchment that she recognized as the Marauders Map open in front of him.

With an odd look of confusion, Sirius looked right through her and then at the map. Then though her again and back at the map.

"_What the hell?_" she heard him mumbled under his breath. It was clear he couldn't see her thanks to the disillusionment charm and the map said otherwise – if she hadn't felt so… distressed, she might have found that amusing. "_Hum… are you there Mia?_" he asked in a not-very-hopeful voice.

"I'm here," she responded to his confusion. Her tone came out feebler than she'd expected. That was one of the reasons why she hated crying – even her voice got all messed up by it…

She shook her head absently and reached for her wand to remove the disillusionment charm. By the time she did it, he'd already closed the map and was putting it back in his pocket, making his way to her just as soon as he saw her face.

"You're crying," he said, enveloping her with his arms and rubbing her back softly.

"No, I'm not," she mumbled stubbornly, yet relaxing against his hold, letting herself sink into the comfort of it.

"Well, your eyes seem to disagree with you, love," Sirius told her softly, pulling back a bit, just to brush her tears away with his sleeve.

"I hate crying," she mumbled, sniffing before she mentally ordered herself to get back together. "I'm sorry. I was just… having a moment."

He shifted, sliding a hand behind her back and walking her to a nearby tree so they could seat down on the floor against it. "You can have all the moments you need, Mia. I suppose you're entitled to them now."

She nodded silently, resting her arm on her bent legs and looking down at the grass on the floor as they sat down. "So…" she asked, hesitatingly, "where's Harry?"

"At his DADA class, last I checked," he told her shortly. He wasn't sure how much he should press the matter about Harry right now – he wasn't sure how much she could handle that soon after the fight. "Are you okay?"

"I don't know," she mumbled, turning to him. "I just can't believe Harry would think… do you think it might have been me?" Her throat felt incredibly dry as she asked him that – that possibly was what she'd feared the most ever since she'd stormed out of her husband's office. "Do you think it's something I did that made him think he was a… a burden?"

"Of course not, Mia," Sirius told her immediately. "That's a ridiculous idea."

"Is it?" she asked, standing up again and starting to pace once more. "Because lately I haven't had a chance to act as much like a mom to him and Izzy as I used to before, back when it was just them. I mean, Alex is a handful and Mary is still so little yet… Between the two of them and everything else…" _What sort of mother would make their kid feel like a burden?_ Part of her questioned, making her feel just horrible. Maybe _she _was the problem. She clenched her job so hard, trying to keep the tears from falling again. This time, she was successful.

"It's nothing about that," Sirius told her firmly, reaching for her hand and tugging it back down, asking her to sit by his side again. When she did, he kissed her cheek softly. "Listen, during that time that passed between you storming off and me coming here, I was talking to Harry and, believe me, the reason why he thought he was a burden was far from you making him feel like you're… alienating him or something. It's the opposite reason, actually – he thinks that after all you've done for him, the least you deserve is to have a happy, unpreoccupied life."

"What?"

"He just wants you to be happy, Mia. That's it. And he thought that him 'dragging us' into the war is what is keeping you from that blissfully happy life – it took me while, but I think I managed to convince him that he didn't drag anyone into any war and that he's far from a burden. Look, all that time I spent talking to him it was clear that he loves you and doesn't doubt that you love him right back – he only kept the Horcruxes from you trying to protect you and from me so I wouldn't have to chose between keeping the secret for him or telling you."

"But he shouldn't worry about protecting me," Mia mumbled, half relieved, half frustrated. "From the truth, much less! I'm an adult and perfectly capable of protecting myself if I need to."

Sirius sighed. "Sometimes it's just hard for us to help it, love," he told her. "Listen, the kid is really sorry he hurt you. You could see it from miles away. And it's also clear he loves you like a parent – that's a bond only the two of you have."

She shook her head. "But you…"

"I am more like a… cool uncle or a close mate to him than a dad, Mia. And that's to be expected: you've been taking care of him since he was a baby, I just showed up when he was nearly fourteen and missed out a lot. Same with Izzy but I guess in her case I was lucky she was open to become a Daddy's girl. With all this I'm trying to say that you didn't do a thing to make him think he was a pain in our arses – he's just… Harry. Add the teenager factor to that and you'll have a really confused kis with a knack for blaming himself for whatever bad things happen in the lives of people close to him." He reached for Mia's hair, running his hands soothingly through it. "He never meant to hurt you."

Her eyes were glittering with tears again when Sirius was finished and she reached up to dry them just as soon as she realized it. "That daft boy," she mumbled under her breath, irritated. "I hope you told him I'm not some… helpless ninny that he needs to be shielded from the truth."

Sirius managed to grin, then, and his arm came down to circle her frame. "He wouldn't dare think of that but I'm pretty sure I said something along those lines."

"And what about the Horcruxes? Did he say anything else about them?"

Sirius shook his head. "Only that he intends to destroy them all. Oh, and Dumbledore apparently promised him that he'll let him help get rid of the next one he finds."

Mia sniffed at the mention of the Headmaster. "I just don't get that man. I really don't. Before starting the lessons, he came to us and asked us if we were okay with him teaching them to Harry. Then, not another word about it! He didn't even bother to let us know that Harry's sworn enemy has his soul spread in pieces all over the world, for what we know! All this time we've all but trusted him with our lives and he can't trust us with something concerning our own godson's life!"

Sirius nodded. "Sounds shady, doesn't it? I suppose that now that we're here at Hogwarts, we should use the opportunity to go have a little chat with Dumbledore about it."

To his surprise, Mia shook her head in a 'no'. "Don't bother. I headed straight there when I left your office but that gargoyle guarding his office told me he had left the school to handle some 'personal business' and hadn't said when he was coming back!" She huffed in frustration – he was probably looking for a Horcrux, she imagined. "Of all the times he could disappear…"

"We'll just have to wait for another day," Sirius said, rubbing one of her arms. Then, he let out a deep breath. "Well, are you okay now?"

"Almost," she whispered back – before being completely okay, she needed to talk to Harry and right now she didn't feel quite ready for that yet… _Tomorrow,_ she told herself.

"So," he started in a tone of conclusion, "today I had to play a role of the respectable adult in my chat with Harry and then again a little with you. It was interesting."

"I bet you wish you won't have to do it again anytime soon," Mia said, her lips curling slightly.

"I guess it does work better for me in small doses," Sirius admitted sheepishly. He looked at Mia, then. "Well, do you want to stay here a little longer of do you want to go home?"

She sighed and leaned closer, kissing the corner of his mouth very softly as a way of thanking him for… everything. It occurred to her that decades before it had been somewhere near that spot where they sat together that Sirius had kissed her for the first time. "Take me home," she whispered. That day, she didn't want to think of Horcruxes, secrets or burdens. She really just wanted to go home. _The rest can wait for tomorrow_.

**A/N: This comes like twelve hours late and I am really sorry but it was inevitable this time. **

**So, a few days ago one of my teachers got me another intern-ship interview and... long story shot, after hours waiting in some uncomfortable office, the interview went really well (thank god!) and this time I was accepted! I'm starting this Friday. Hopefully, it won't interfere much with me writing this fic as I'll try to manage my time better but I'll be working 8 hours a day for the next six weeks so there may be a delay or two with the chapters (I'm crossing my fingers so that it won't happen)****... **

**Meanwhile, I hope you like the chapter - I spent hours writing and deleting segments because it wouldn't end up the way I wanted until I managed to get it approved by my very self-critic self... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	20. Promises

When the day after his fight with Mia dawned, Harry felt like he had knot blocking his throat. A really big one. He didn't have class with her that day but he certainly had to at least apologize to Mia – it was just the least he could do, after his asinine performance in the previous day. All night long he'd thought of what to tell her and had successfully come up with a big, heart-touching speech at some point. Little problem, though – he could barely remember a single word of it now… It was like having gone to sleep had deleted that epic speech out of his head (except this little yet very meaningful part that took part after the apology and had come to him like an epiphany) and now there he was, trying to compose it again.

"You don't need any big shot speech for anything," Ginny told him, rolling her eyes when he happened to mention the case to her in the morning as he walked with her to the Great Hall. "You only need to apologize to her – tell her what you feel. That will be worth ten times more than some deeply trained speech, Harry."

"Yeah, I guess," he mumbled as he walked, looking down with his hands shoved into his pockets. "But last time I went ahead and told Mia exactly what I felt, I ended up saying too much," he said, recalling his… mishandling of the Horcrux situation in the previous day.

Now, after a long night of sleep, a talk with Ron and Hermione, then Ginny and then Izzy – that last one involving her calling him an idiot repeatedly, which he hadn't really denied, and kicking him once in the shins like her six-year-old self used to do (Harry had this theory that Izzy tended to downgrade in terms of mental age whenever she was pissed off, which would explain the kicking) before beginning to get over it and proceeding to discuss what he already knew and what he was planning to do about the Horcruxes – he realized that his words about 'Mia's life being easier without him there' had not only hurt his godmother, maybe even more so than the Horcrux situation itself, but also not been true at all.

"Well, bite your tongue if you feel something stupid like that coming," Ginny told him, rolling her eyes. "A burden… Sometimes I wonder why you guys even have a brain if you clearly forget to use it most of the time. "

Harry sighed. "Alright, I wasn't really thinking well at the time but it made sense in my head," he mumbled lamely. "So, what do I tell her? I just can't think."

Ginny gave him a sympathetic pat on the arm as they stopped in front of the Great Hall's doors. "Start with 'I'm sorry'. The rest will come as you speak," she told him. "Take my word – I'm the master of apologies. I've had enough training: Mom always made me apologize to that git Percy for completely messing up his room whenever he acted like a pompous prat to the rest of us. Before she grounded me, that is…"

"I'll go ahead and assume that happened a lot," Harry stated.

She grinned. "A lot, really. Half the time Mom would end up demanding he apologized back to me because my apologies were sooo convincing – I don't think I need to tell you I rarely meant them. Anyway, if I managed to pull it off so many times not meaning it, I bet Mia will understand when say you're sorry and actually mean it. Just don't overthink it. And speaking of the devil…"

Harry looked in the same direction Ginny was facing and, through the large arch that led to the main staircase, caught a glance of his godmother emerging from the entrance of the first floor, walking up the stairs in a hurried pace with Sirius by her side, apparently as both of them headed somewhere in a rush with rather annoyed expressions on their faces. Neither of them seemed to have spotted him or Ginny standing there as they didn't turn their heads or stopped walking at all, disappearing around the corner a few seconds after Ginny had first spotted them.

"Where do you figure they're going?" Ginny asked him with her eyebrows raised.

He shook his head. "No idea," he mumbled, concluding that maybe he should delay his apology to Mia for another couple of hours – she definitely hadn't seemed in a forgiving mood right now…

"Potter, Weasley!" a very unpleasant voice shouted from behind them all of a sudden. The two of them turned to see themselves facing none other than Snape, as dark and sober as ever. "Are you intending to stand here in the middle of the hall blocking the way all day or are you planning to move at some point to get your breakfasts and go to classes like you're supposed to?" he asked, even though they were far from blocking the way to anyone – there were at least eight feet between them and the door of the Great Hall and there were several people standing much closer to it than them.

Harry locked his jaw, forcing the spiteful response that had been about to roll off his tongue to remain inside his mouth – he already had detention on Saturday for helping Neville with a spell during his last DADA class and he certainly didn't need his weekend ruined too…

"Why, we had no idea you needed so much space in order to get into the Great Hall, Professor," she said in an all-too-sweet tone before taking a step back and gesturing her hand towards the large wooden doors of the Great Hall. "Please, do pass."

The teacher mumbled something under his breath and, after grimacing at Harry, he walked into the Great Hall on his own.

Harry sighed then. "I just don't get how you can get away with telling him stuff like that – I think you all but accused him of either being fat, which he isn't, or not being able to walk in a straight like," he mumbled. "He'd have given me a night of detention just for opening my mouth."

Ginny flashed him a grin. "Must be my charms and sparkling personality," she replied with a bright smile on her face. "Or maybe he just doesn't want to give you the pleasure of having your girlfriend serving detention along with you."

He shrugged. "Maybe."

She chuckled and got a hold of his hand. "Come on, Harry, let's feed you some breakfast. According to Ron, food heals everything from depression to dragon pox."

Harry groaned. "If only…

* * *

"You're sure McGonagall said he was in his office?" Mia asked as she and Sirius rushed through the hallways of the school, heading to the headmaster's quarters.

Her husband nodded, following her. "I'm sure. She mentioned Dumbledore arrived from his little mission, or whatever he was doing all day yesterday, a couple of hours ago and headed straight to his office." Though their chat had been cut short because he'd been on a rush to go and tell Mia about all of it, Sirius had noted that McGonagall had also seemed quite irritated with the Headmaster when he'd ran into her only ten minutes before – no doubt because Dumbledore must have refused to share with her whatever he'd been doing on his own during the past day…

"Good," his wife mumbled through her teeth as her pace became even more slightly rushed, so willing she was to reach the headmaster. "Then I can finally give him a piece of my mind. Did you ask her for the password to get in the office?" Mia asked as she spotted the gargoyle at the end of the hallway they'd been walking along.

He nodded. "Yeah. 'Chocolate and Raspberry Wands' – I'd never heard of that one before. Must be some foreign sweet."

"Must be," she mumbled absently before repeating the password to the gargoyle, which opened way for them to climb up the narrow stairwell that led up to the antechamber that preceded Dumbledore's office.

Sirius cleared his throat as they reached it and Mia headed straight to the office's door. "You should probably knoc…" But he wasn't able to finish saying that as Mia simply burst the door open and barged into the room. "Oh, never mind."

"We need to talk," Mia announced in a firm tone.

The fact that, despite the sudden entrance, Dumbledore didn't seem at all surprised to see her had Sirius wondering, as he walked in after Mia, if somehow the older guy had a way of knowing exactly who was coming up to his office even before they stepped in. The older man simply sat peacefully behind his desk with an unreadable look on his face as he observed Mia. Sometimes the guy was just a downright mystery…

"Amelia, fancy to see you," Dumbledore said pleasantly before turning to Sirius and giving him a nod. "Sirius."

"Dumbledore," he replied, remaining neutral in all that. I felt so weird having to be the rational one for once. Maybe he should start giving Mia more credit for putting up with his antics with Snape…

"Why didn't you tell us about the Horcruxes, Albus?" Mia demanded, leaving aside any sort of build up to her words. She stood a couple of feet away from the desk with her hands on her hips and looking at the headmaster with a rather intimidating expression on her face. "We had a right to know!"

"So, young Harry has told you about them, then," Dumbledore concluded quietly.

"No_, he didn't_, actually. I accidentally heard him discussing it with his friends and _then_ he told us," she replied angrily. "And from what I gather, you've known about them for _years_!"

He sighed. "Amelia, please sit down."

"No. I'd rather stay up," she told him stubbornly, crossing her arms against her chest.

Sirius sighed. Now she was throwing a tantrum or something – for Mia those were rare outside of pregnancy and when they came… well, it was as far as it could be from great. It looked like he'd need to make some damage control before she made anything blow up with her wand…

He approached her from behind, his hand touching her back softly and his lips reaching towards her ear – he figured a gentle approach would be easier on everyone, including himself. "Calm down, love. Sit down and let Dumbledore explain," he whispered to her.

She turned to him for a moment and, thank Merlin, didn't seem very bummed for him having butted in. Mia just let out a groan and said an annoyed 'fine'. She reached for a wooden chair resting in front of the desk and sat down, while Sirius did the same by her side. Then, she aimed her best glare back at Dumbledore, silently demanding for him to speak.

The headmaster let out a breath, then. "Sirius, Amelia, I never meant to keep this… Horcrux situation from you."

"You didn't make a very good job making it seem that way, Dumbledore," Mia pointed out. "If you have first learned about them after that Chamber of Secrets fiasco, you've known this for nearly _four years_ and none of us had any idea until the day before yesterday. If that's not keeping it from us, I honestly don't know the meaning of the expression 'keeping something from someone' at all."

Dumbledore sighed. "I realize that, Amelia. Believe me, I do." He took a moment to weigh his words before saying them. "Harry was twelve… no, nearly thirteen years old back when I discovered this through the diary. He was practically a child himself. If I told you about the Horcruxes back then, I'd have to tell you about the prophecy too. And what would you have done, Amelia, if I had told you that not only Harry was destined to defeat Lord Voldemort but _also_ that it would be a task several times harder than it seemed because he'd split his soul into pieces in order to fool death? Would you have told him? Especially when, back then, you would have needed to deal with it on your own since Sirius was still imprisoned?"

Mia didn't respond because she didn't know how to answer that. Back then, the only person that had even remotely helped her with parenting was Lulu – and frankly, Mia was pretty sure Lulu wouldn't have an answer for that either… What would she do, faced with something like that? Telling him would have been… crushing. Too much weight to put over a boy just growing out of his childhood. But not telling him either… she'd just had quite a row with Harry for that exact same reason. It would be at the very least hypocrital considering doing the same. And how it irritated her that Dumbledore had just made a fair point…

"What I thought and still think I was doing by not telling you back then," Dumbledore continued, "was choosing between you having to make that choice and facing Harry every day knowing the truth or me doing it instead because it would cost me less, Amelia."

Mia gritted her teeth, then, annoyance increasing. "I'm a grown person, Albus! I don't need you or anyone protecting me from the truth. Especially if the truth is about my son!"

She was getting explosive again, Sirius observed. He reached with his hand to touch hers, making her momentarily look at him – it either meant she'd explode at him next or she'd calm down… hopefully, it was the latter. When she didn't speak and simply closed her mouth, locking her jaw as if trying to keep the words from leaving her mouth, Sirius concluded it was something in between. He turned to Dumbledore himself, then, taking his turn at the conversation. "Look, Dumbledore, what bums us the most isn't you not having told us back then, it's you having told Harry and not even mentioning it to us before, during or after you did it."

"You should have come to us first," Mia spoke again. "Or at the very least asked us to be there when you told him. Why the hell didn't you? Do you think we wouldn't let him do what he has to do? Destroy those Horcruxes? Because we don't have any other choice but letting him, knowing what we know!"

"It wasn't for anything such as that," Dumbledore told them. "Not telling you myself… I was counting on Harry telling you on his own…"

"But he didn't! And I'd bet anything that you knew he hadn't told us, maybe even why he hadn't and still didn't say a word, Albus," Mia replied.

Dumbledore nodded – there was no use denying it to them. He'd done it thinking it was for the best, after all. "Yes, I knew he'd decided not to tell you about the Horcruxes but when I asked him why, he responded saying it was for the best. I had to respect his decision, Amelia. If I didn't, I might lose his trust…"

"Well, that makes a lot of sense except what about our trust, Dumbledore?" Sirius asked, stepping into the conversation this time. "We put our lives in your hands over and over, tell you all we know and now you've pretty much kept us in the dark about everything that happened in your lessons with Harry and the Horcruxes. Let's put it like this: if he was your kid, wouldn't you want to know if the lunatic who'd been trying to kill him since he was a baby had split his soul into seven parts? Thinking that would help him beat death in some twisted way? Wouldn't you be pretty angry if someone you trusted kept that from you on purpose?"

Dumbledore didn't respond – they were right about that. As much as he didn't want it to be true, it was. He knew he was growing desperate. The clock was ticking faster and faster for him – he might have months ahead of him or maybe just weeks. It was hard to tell. Though it was unknown to everyone, his death was imminent and as much as he didn't fear death itself, he feared leaving unfinished business behind, which was revealing itself to be an inevitability. Having Harry's trust was essential now more than ever because, after he was gone, all would fall on the boy. He felt for him, mourned for the task that had been placed upon him but there was nothing he could do about it. All he could do now was preparing him but maybe he had gone too far trying to keep his trust…

Mia huffed and rejoined the argument. "You should have just come to us or at least hinted something! Harry is not some… completely parentless boy that needs to deal with troubles on his own already. He has us! You had no right to keep us in the dark, Albus. He's still underage. Until the day he turns seventeen, Sirius and I are responsible for him."

"I understand," Dumbledore said, his tone very low, almost timid. "Maybe I didn't handle this in the best way."

The look that Mia gave him clearly meant a sarcastic _"Don't say…"_ She didn't speak it out loud though, not feeling like upsetting herself further by yelling at the headmaster. It was just bizarre lecturing a guy old enough to be her… great-great-grandfather or something. Especially when that guy was, well, a model and a legend to most of the Wizarding World, including herself.

"So…" Sirius started, intending to avoid the silence that was threatening to arrive, "this Horcrux thing… did you find any other during your absence?"

"I didn't, no. But I believe I may be close to one… the lead that I'm following is a strong one. Maybe you should know Harry insisted I let him help me get the next one and destroy it," the headmaster told them, trying to ease the tension by being open to them. "I hope you don't have a problem with that."

Maybe they did, Mia thought. But on the other hand, they didn't really have a choice if they wanted Harry to be ready for whatever was to come, did they?

"Just how hard are they to destroy?" Sirius asked. "Harry said something about your…" he gestured with his own hand, not sure 'dead hand' would be a very tactful way to put it. "Is that… usual? Serious injuries?"

Dumbledore sighed and lifted the damaged limb to show it to them – thank Merlin, they thought, it was wrapped with bandages, blocking it from their sight. For a moment, the healer in Mia wondered if it had gotten even worse… if it was even possible, that was. "I'm afraid this was only the product of my own foolishness," the headmaster told them sadly. "The object that held the Horcrux itself was cursed and I didn't consider that – I've already warned Harry against the dangers of Horcruxes and I'm sure he was already aware of them after all he witnessed Tom Riddle's diary doing to Miss Weasley, so I'm fairly sure he won't be tempted to underestimate the danger." Dumbledore sighed, then. "It's a lot of pressure to put on a boy of his age but Harry has proven himself capable many times already."

"We know," Mia mumbled before suddenly standing up before he had a chance to apologize – she couldn't deal with letting Dumbledore off the hook just yet. "I'm late for class already. I should go."

The headmaster nodded and stood up as well like Sirius did. "I won't keep you any longer."

Mia responded with another nod and turned around to walk away and get out of the office. It was only after she'd reached the bottom step of the spiral staircase connecting the office to the rest of the castle that she turned to face Sirius. She was about to say something but stopped herself.

"What?" her husband asked.

"Nothing. It's just… I'll never figure that guy out. Dumbledore. He's just… so complicated to deal with sometimes," she said, looking away again.

"Tell me about it. I spent all the time you were speaking trying to read the expressions of his face and I barely got a thing," Sirius told her. "It's amazing how cool he could remain while you were there yelling at him, though there was a flicker of regret once or twice…"

She sighed before looking up at him again. "I'm sorry I took over that fight. I… you probably had stuff to say too. I barely gave you chance to open your mouth…"

Sirius shook his head immediately, letting her know he hadn't minded. "No, it's okay. You spoke well enough for both of us, love. Actually, you're better with the yelling thing than I am – I suppose mocking and sarcasm suits me better, though I don't think I could pull it off with Dumbledore. He's just… Dumbledore. Mocking him would be just weird."

"Well, imagine yelling at him," Mia replied, taking a deep breath. "Look, I really should go. I'll be lucky if the second years are still in the classroom waiting for me…"

"Well," Sirius started, leaning forward and pressing a kiss to her forehead, which made her relax a little, "go and be a teacher. I'll see you later, then."

She gave him a small smile and motioned to walk away, heading to her classroom. Somehow, she thought, it was barely nine in the morning and the day already felt endless…

* * *

Later, during the mid-morning break from classes, she didn't feel half as stressed or half as upset as she had before. Teaching was good to her… well, unless, like the day before, Mia was just too nervous to concentrate on it, which (to the relief of many students who'd also had class with her in the previous day and witnessed the pitiful lectures) wasn't repeating itself.

She had been busy behind her classroom desk reading some notes for the next class when a voice sounded in the room. "I'm sorry."

Even if she hadn't recognized Harry's voice immediately, Mia wouldn't have needed to look up in order to know it was him standing there. She took a deep breath before lifting her face in order to face him: the look on his face was quite unsure and he seemed to be biting his lower lip nervously. Mia sighed, then, putting the roll of parchment with the notes written on it back down on her desk and getting up.

"Come with me," she instructed her godson, nodding towards the door that led to her office – she figured it might be a good idea not to have that conversation in her classroom since the students for her next class would be showing up in roughly twenty minutes and some tended to arrive far ahead of time – she couldn't risk them walking in on them talking about such personal matters. It was… personal.

Harry followed her into the office and stood awkwardly in the centre of it as his godmother closed and locked the doors, trying to keep the conversation private. What was he supposed to say now? Ginny had said it would flow out but it just wasn't happening! Maybe he should say it again… "I'm sorry," he repeated. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I really didn't. Not with the Horcrux thing or the burden thing. I just…"

Mia didn't let him finish – taking an understanding tone. "Sirius told me about what you talked about with him yesterday, so you don't need to explain it again, Harry," she declared quietly before letting out yet another sigh and sitting on her sofa, which he also did, putting his book bag down on the floor. She'd spent the past night trying to settle on what to do with Harry and the decision had come eventually. "Just promise me one thing, okay? Promise me next time you'll just come to Sirius or to me and tell us whatever it is that is bothering you. I know you were just trying to protect me but I deal better with bad news that with no news, Harry."

He nodded, glad she put it in such simple terms. "Okay… I can promise that. And on what I said about the burden…"

Her face hardened for a moment – that was still a sensitive matter. "You'll be in big trouble if I ever hear you saying that again or even get a wind that you're thinking it, Harry James Potter!" she warned him, narrowing her eyes to slits.

He gulped before clearing his throat. "So noted. But I just wanted you to know that… you never gave me a reason to feel like that. It was stupid of me. So…" he started, hesitating, "I'm sorry for it." There was a silent pause before he spoke again. "Are we good?"

Mia sighed and reached forward, enveloping her godson in a tight hug, which completely caught him by surprise, making him only respond to it after a few seconds. "You silly boy. What on Earth am I going to do with you?" she whispered, rubbing his back for a few moments as she held him.

"I have no idea," he replied. A few seconds later as they pulled away, Harry glanced at her with a confident look on his face and an expression that seemed to be leaning towards a smile. She could tell forgiveness had been a genuine relief to him. "Can I make you another promise?" he asked her, then.

Mia raised an eyebrow, wondering what it was but gave him a nod. "As many as you want."

He took a gulp before speaking. "If," he paused, shook his head and started again. "When this is all over, Voldemort is gone and we can go on with our lives," he said, hoping, dearly hoping, that time would arrive at some point, sooner rather than later, "I promise I'll start calling you 'Mom'."

She felt her whole body freeze as soon as she heard those words and spent at least ten seconds just staring at him. "Harry…" she started feebly. "You know I don't mind you not… you don't have to."

He shook his head. "But I want to. I never called it to you before because… well, because I just got used to calling you Aunt Mia. That was what you always called yourself when you talked to me."

Mia nodded and let out a deep breath. "It felt like a betrayal to Lily telling you to call me Mom or giving myself that title when speaking to you, Harry. It was just a title but… it felt important to keep it saved for Lily back then…"

Harry shook his head once again. "She'd understand. I can't actually remember her but people, especially you, Sirius and Remus, tell me so much about her and my dad that it feels like I really know them. And the Lily Potter that I know in my head wouldn't mind at all me calling you Mom after you've acted as just that since I was a baby. What you said yesterday after I said the… er… burden thing… it really got to me. I never questioned that you were also my mom but what you said… it made me realize I _want_ to call you that. I could start doing it now but it seems more meaningful to do it after the storm is over." Sort of like a reward, he imagined.

She bit her lower lip for a fraction of a second before sighing and pulling him into yet another hug, making him chuckle. "Thank you, Harry. Just… thank you." Funny how that gesture meant to her so much more than she'd thought before… Merlin, she hoped she wasn't heading towards a whole weeping session, Mia thought as she took a deep breath and pulled away from him. "It will be something to look forward to."

He grinned. "Yeah, some here. So… I'm really off the hook?"

Mia chuckled. "As long as you keep that first promise you made, yes, you are."

"I'll do all I can to," Harry vowed solemnly before getting up and reaching for his bag of books. "So… I should go. I have Potions now with Slughorn."

Mia nodded and got up as well, leading him to the door that led straight to the castle's corridor and opening it. Just as he was about to turn back around, she touched his arm, making him look back at her. "Be careful, okay?" she requested. Her tone showed she didn't just mean during his way to the dungeons

Harry replied by nodding his head. "I always am." And with that, he turned around and sped away so he wouldn't be late.

Mia sighed, closing the door again. A smile crept on her face as she sat. Usually, one said that when things seemed like they couldn't get worse, they did. Now, after earlier that morning she'd thought things were so bad that it would be nearly impossible for them to get better, they had. And that was a pretty good feeling.

**A/N: As I had warned, a delay did happen... sorry guys. Internship is fun but it's also murder... I get home pretty much exhausted and finding time to write is, well, like finding the right numbers for the lottery. But I still managed. I hope you liked the chapter. Feedback is sooo welcome - review!**


	21. Confrontation

**11**** May 1997**

A couple of weeks passed since Mia and Harry's reconciliation after the Horcrux situation and, so far, that time had been rather eventless in terms of Death Eater attacks or other sorts of trouble, leaving the Order mostly inactive and worried about the meaning of that eventlessness.

Following the conflict with the Blacks concerning his omission of the Horcruxes, Dumbledore seemed have decided to give them an update on it every once or twice a week mentioning anything he had or not found about that matter. Though lately she'd been holding sort of a grudge against the headmaster, barely acknowledging him with anything other than a polite nod, Mia felt thankful for that since, well, it helped keeping them aware of what was going on. She knew it was sort of a way for Dumbledore to relieve his conscience. But it still helped a little.

The day of the eleventh of May dawned calmly and also remained calm until the time when Sirius and Mia arrived home around two o'clock in the afternoon after teaching their classes of a day and having lunch out in Muggle London. The house was empty when they got there: Gabe and Lulu were taking little Mary, Alex and his friend Darcy to the Muggle zoo and weren't supposed to come back for a few hours and Kreacher was… well, they simply had no idea where he was.

"I don't know. Maybe he went out to get groceries for dinner or something," Mia told her husband when he asked her about the house-elf's whereabouts while they climbed up the stairs, headed to the living room. "You know he mostly stays out of the way when the kids aren't around."

A grin covered her husband's face as he heard her response. "Hum, good," he said. "That is good."

Mia spun around as they reached the first floor and narrowed her eyes at him. "I know that tone," she warned him.

He forced an innocent look on his face, then. "What tone, love?"

"The one you used when you said 'good'. Don't pretend you don't know what it is, Sirius Orion Black," she said.

The innocent look remained on its place even as he approached her and rubbed his knuckles softly on her cheek in a gentle caress. "I'm sorry, love, but I have no idea what you're talking about." Lie. "Maybe you'll have to enlighten me." But he didn't even give her a chance to do it. At least not in a verbal way. Instead, he leaned further and crushed her lips with his.

Mia convinced herself it was mostly out of instinct that she responded immediately. Nothing to do with the fact that she couldn't resist that damn handsome bloke that was kissing her who happened to be married to her. Who was all hers. "I knew that was your 'I see a good opportunity to shag you in the horizon' look," she mumbled in a rough voice

"Is that a problem?" he asked her with a charming look, softly pushing her into the living room, where she dumped the bag she was carrying on a chair.

Well, being Sirius the eager bloke, it was her duty to give him a bit of a fight by acting as the reluctant one. So, Mia let out a worried sigh. "I wouldn't want you to think I'm the sort of girl that just jumps on a guy without some romantic gesture to build up to it," she whispered teasingly. "It's the least he can do, isn't it?"

"Hey, I recall us having a pretty romantic lunch less than an hour ago," he told her.

She raised a sceptical eyebrow. "We ate a hamburger sandwich and chips at some Muggle food-chain restaurant, Sirius, that's hardly considered a romantic lunch," she pointed out. She wasn't sure if he really thought of it as a romantic gesture of if he was using it as an excuse. But knowing him, her money would be on the second – Sirius simply wasn't that dense, was he?

He gave her a grin, pulling her. "But love," he said, faking extreme innocence, "we shared a dose of chips and one of those chocolate Saturday ice creams or whatever they're called. I just don't do that with every girl. Plus, it's the company that counts, right? Anyway, Muggles seem to like that burger stuff a lot – I imagined it might be nice for us to try it. Wasn't that bad, was it?" He kissed her lips again and gave her a charming smile. "I promise I'll work on something better next time."

That last part, she knew, he meant. She smiled even though all that time she'd known that a special meal or something didn't matter all that much. Not really. Just as long as he was there, those things didn't really matter. "You're lucky I find you so wildly attractive, Mr. Black," she whispered reaching with her lips closer to his ear.

He grinned. "You're rather easy in the eyes too," Sirius told her as she pulled back a little, just enough so their lips were now around a quarter inch apart. "So? Sofa?" He nodded at the piece of furniture a few feet away.

"Hum, there's nobody else in the hou…" He didn't let her finish, not resisting kissing her again. They edged closer to the sofa, their lips impossibly remaining together. How they didn't fall down, knocked something over or stepped on each other's feet, so entranced they were in the kissing part, was a mystery – the fact was that there neither causalities nor wounded by the time reached down for the sofa, still taking a seating position. But before they got any further, the sound of tapping on the window startled them.

"Ignore it," he mumbled, seeing an owl through the corner of his eye.

Mia tried to do so at first. Still, the tapping continued, in an increasingly bugging fashion, becoming incessant. It was just bloody annoying! "It could be important," Mia said finally, pulling away as she felt something tightening within her chest. Could be just an Owl with an annoying personality. Could be news, good or bad… "I gotta check," she said, standing up.

Sirius groaned, leaning against the back of the sofa and sighing as a pout took over his face – if anyone saw him at that moment, they'd say he looked just like a kid who'd been stolen his favourite piece of sweet. A really pretty one, he thought as he observed his wife rushing to the window, even if her hair a mess of knots thanks to his roaming hands and her face awfully flushed from the kissing. Why was it that, between Lulu, their younger kids wailing or bloody owls delivering messages they ended up interrupted so many times?

She glared at the wretched bird. "This had better be important," she told the owl under her breath while she untied the little roll of parchment from its leg. With its mission accomplished, the owl flew away just as Mia was unrolling the small note. Small but enough to sour her mood even further… "Oh, not again," she mumbled.

Sirius stood up from the sofa as soon as he heard the words, expecting the worse. "What is it?" he asked even before having the chance to look over her shoulder and read the words written on the note.

"McGonagall is fetching us to Hogwarts right now because Harry is in trouble. 'In a disciplinary sense of the word', according to her," Mia said, huffing and crumpling the paper into a ball in irritation and throwing it straight out of the window without thinking. "Is somebody kidding me? More trouble? It's like we bought season tickets for the whole bloody trouble league!"

"Well, at least if it's in a disciplinary sense, he's probably not in trouble in a… life or death sense," Sirius pointed out, feeling a hint of relief bursting within his chest. "And, let's face it, it's probably another one of Snape's tantrums, since he's had hundreds of them already in this school-year alone."

Mia laughed sarcastically. "Well, that's just mind-settling. And McGonagall wouldn't have us called if it wasn't serious." She sighed and looked up at him. "Looks like we'll have to leave our plans for later."

He raised an eyebrow. "You seem pretty upset for someone who was being so difficult at first."

"Oh, shut up," she mumbled, huffing and getting the shoes she had discarded at some point in order to put them back on so they could leave.

They ended up using the floo connection to Mia's office, as usual, and didn't have to take a long stretch of corridors and more corridors in order to reach McGonagall's since it was relatively close to Mia's.

As they were about to turn around the corner and reaching the hallway that led to the deputy headmistress's office, they started hearing the echo of voices that at some point they recognized as Snape and McGonagall's – they must be discussing something right outside of the latter's office, Mia concluded. Before they took the final step that would make them visible to the other two, Sirius stopped and motioned to make his wife do the same – they couldn't waste that chance to gather a little information from the conversation and avoid being caught by surprise…

"…_and I demand you take an action about thi__s, Minerva. Potter can't get away with this!"_ they heard Snape saying in a stern tone.

"See? I told you it was one of Snape's fits," Sirius whispered to his wife, who sighed in return. Those were happening way too often.

McGonagall's voice followed Snape's. _"Severus, I will not take any action until Potter's guardians are here. Since you are so keen on defending Mr. Malfoy's side and Mrs. Malfoy is on her way here as well, I imagine it's only fair Potter has a cheering crowd too. And I would advise you to quit making demands."_

It seemed the discussion was ended there since neither Snape tried to reply nor McGonagall continued. Seeing no use in eavesdropping anymore, Mia turned to her husband, signalling for them to just resume heading to McGonagall's office. He shrugged in return and followed her closely.

Snape was the first to see them, stiffening just as soon as he did and mumbling something under his breath that, even though they couldn't hear it, appeared to be an insult. McGonagall turned as well a couple of seconds later and sighed when she saw them.

"Mia, Sirius, I'm sorry I ruined your afternoon but I thought you ought to be called for this," McGonagall told them.

"It's fine," Mia told her. "What happened? What did Harry do?"

"Your troublemaker of a godson…" Snape started, more than glad to put things in those terms.

"We'll leave it for him to explain," McGonagall interrupted, motioning towards her office's door, which she opened. "If you'd accompany me…" she requested.

They came in to see Harry and Malfoy with their backs turned to them sitting opposite McGonagall's desk, their chairs around five feet away from each other like they were being kept apart. Filch was also inside, pacing as he held his precious cat, Mrs. Norris and petting her – he seemed to be in charge of keeping them from jumping at each other's throats.

"Thank you for your help, Argus. You're free to go," McGonagall dismissed the caretaker, who appeared not to happy with it – likely, Sirius thought, the creep had been hoping to get a chance to whip at least one of the culprits, so to speak.

It was only when both Harry and Malfoy turned around to check who had came in that Sirius and Mia noticed the poor state they were in.

"What on Earth…?" Mia mumbled staring at Harry's split and swollen lip that definitely matched with Malfoy's swollen eye. "You got yourself into a fight, for Merlin's sake?"

"It wasn't me who started it!" Harry replied to her. "Malfoy was!"

"I did not!" Malfoy replied, lying. "Potter jumped out of nowhere and started throwing curses at me! He's mad!"

"That's bogus! If anyone is mad, it's you! Must be from spending so much time in the Room of Requirement plotting stuff! Conspiracy is bad for sanity – just look at your master!"

"Enough!" McGonagall shouted at both of them. "I will not have a childish fight between two nearly off-age wizards inside my own office! Each one of you, Potter and Malfoy, will speak at his own time. There will be no interrupti…"

"My baby!" The horrified cry came just as Narcissa Malfoy walked in with the same superior fashion she seemed to be such a fan of. Her cold blue eyes darted to Sirius, taking a fraction of second to 'greet' her cousin with a glare, and then at Harry, who was terrifyingly reminded of a basilisk's eyes just as soon as saw the way she looked – at least her eyes didn't have the same powers to kill or he'd have dropped dead. "How _dare_ you attack my son?"

"Narcissa, please, calm down," McGonagall intervened as she moved to stand behind her desk, facing the two young boys.

"How am I supposed to calm down when that filthy half-blood troublemaker attacked my Draco?"

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "When will you realize that blood-status insults are losing their charms? And what tells you it wasn't your sweet beloved Draco that attacked Harry, _Cissy_?"

"How dare you?" she shouted, outraged. "Unlike your hand-me-down brat, my Draco had a prime upbringing…"

"First of all, the only thing that's hand-me-down in this room is your bitchiness that came straight from Bella when she decided being a maniac was better than being a bitch!" Sirius replied. "Second of all, prime upbringing? Let's face it, being raised by a hag like you would hardly give him a decent set of morals."

The way his cousin's mouth opened, it seemed like she was about to shout. Yet, McGonagall beat her to it. "That will be enough! Insulting and cursing in front of students?" Her eyes were blazing and for a moment it seemed like she wanted to strangle them both. "That is unacceptable. Now, either both of you mind your language or I'll begin to think that calling you to intervene in this matter was my mistake!"

Both Sirius and Narcissa's response was based in silence. He glanced down at Mia, trying to figure if she was also angry at him, seeing as he'd failed in controlling this tongue – who could blame him? – and was surprised to see her giving him an approving nod. Harry seemed to be enjoying the show quite much, shooting him a quick smile.

"As I was going to do before this pitiful show started," McGonagall started, shooting another glare at Sirius and then at Narcissa, "I'll leave it up to Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Potter to give you the full story."

"I think Malfoy should be the one to start," Snape suggested in a bland tone. "After all, he seems to be the one who was attacked…"

"That's a lie!" Harry yelled.

"Five points from Gryffindor for interrupting a teacher!" the head of the Slytherin house said.

Mia gave him a look that clearly said '_Oh, really?_' "Five points _to _Gryffindor for successfully correcting a teacher's mistake," she said. "Two can play at that game."

"There will be no point-giving or point-taking in this room until this matter is solved!" McGonagall yelled at both of them. "Have all of you regressed to the mental age of five? Don't make me go fetch the headmaster!" She said that last part, aware that Dumbledore was, once again, running his own errands, whatever they were, outside the school. "Malfoy, give your side of the story and be done with it."

The blonde boy shrugged. "I was in the Bathroom minding my own business before Potter came in and started throwing curses at me. That's all I have to say."

Harry gritted his teeth and shook his head. What use was it to shout 'liar' again when nobody seemed to be interested?

"I want that rascal expelled!" Narcissa shouted, then.

"We still haven't heard Potter's version," McGonagall told her before turning to face Harry. "Well?"

Finally they were letting him give his account of the events. He gave a quick glance to Sirius and Mia, who nodded at him, urging him to speak. "I saw Malfoy's…" He paused. He couldn't say Malfoy's dot – then he'd have to explain about the Marauder's Map and he didn't want that – they'd take it away. No, he'd make up that part. "I was heading back to the Common Room and happened to see Malfoy going into Moaning Myrtle's bathroom on his own and found it odd since it's a _girl's_ bathroom. So, I followed him there and he was having this… deep conversation with Moaning Myrtle all weepy and everything!"

"I was not crying like some… pansy, Potter!" Malfoy yelled, offended and embarrassed at the same tine.

"Oh, yes, you …"

"Gentlemen!" McGonagall called loudly, her patience reaching its limits, making them both go very quiet. "Mr. Malfoy, you've already had your chance to speak, so _be quiet now_. Potter, continue."

Harry gulped as the deputy headmistress looked with narrowed eyes at them both. "Oh, I… er… Malfoy," he said, sending a glare at his school-enemy as he spoke, "was weeping in the bathroom and when he saw me there, _he _started throwing curses at me. I escaped a few and so did he – it went on for a while like that. That is, until he started saying the incantation for the Cruciatus Curse." There was a general gasp as soon as he said that and he continued before being interrupted. "I managed to disarm him first and that's when we started… punching each other… I'm not sure who threw the first punch, though…"

"Wait, what?" Mia asked in horror, staring at Harry. "He tried to use what curse?"

"I did not!" Malfoy lied

"My son did no such thing!" Narcissa yelled, taking a threatening step in Harry's direction as her son sat on his chair with his arms crossed and a pout on his face as if he was throwing a fit. The blonde woman was stopped by Snape, though, who lifted his arm to create a barrier between her and Harry even before Sirius and Mia had the chance to take a step towards her. Narcissa looked at the former Potions Master, irritated at having been stopped and he shook his head.

"Don't make a show, Narcissa," he told her firmly before turning to Harry himself and cleared his throat. "That is very interesting, Potter," Snape said in a low tone. "But do you have any proof for those accusations?"

"Oh, and Malfoy has for his?" Sirius replied, leaning against the wall of the office, only a few feet away from their godson.

"I was there! I saw it! I heard it!" Harry told Snape and, on the chair next to him, Malfoy seemed to go even paler than he usually was. "I can show my memories in a pensieve, can't I? If you Professor McGonagall gives me my wand back and tells me how to get them out…"

"Pensieve memories can be altered!"

"By a sixteen-year-old?" Sirius asked, laughing mockingly. "Well, that would be a feat since I'm thirty-seven and I can't do that myself. Why don't you go grease your hair some more and leave the thinking to the big kids?"

"Sirius!" McGonagall shouted, her left eye apparently twitching at how angry she was. "There are students in the room! If you want to go and trade childish insults, take it _outside_! And as for proving what happened," she turned to Harry, "Potter, you are making very serious accusations involving an unforgivable curse that could give Mr. Malfoy several years of prison-time. However, accusations aren't enough to prove it and your pensieve memories won't be enough to do so as well, I'm afraid."

"They were enough to free me!" Sirius replied.

"Unfortunately," Narcissa mumbled under her breath.

"Oh, bite me, would you?" he replied explosively.

"That was a different case," McGonagall explained, interrupting the squabble. "There were two sources of memories at first, Potter and Miss Granger, that later were joined by Mr. Weasley and Mr. Lupin – it would be impossible to allege that so many people, especially being three of them third-year students, had tempered with their memories or that all of them had misunderstood the situation…" She sighed and shook her head, forcing herself to move on from that matter. "As for the punishment for fighting," McGonagall started, "both of you will serve a week of two-hour detentions at five sharp starting tomorrow. Potter, I'll arrange for you to serve yours with Professor Slughorn," she said, making Harry groan – it wasn't that he didn't like Slughorn. It was just that the guy could be pushy sometimes…

"Minerva," Snape intervened immediately, "may I suggest Potter serves those days of detention with me instead?"

"Yes, you may but it won't change my mind," the older teacher told him. "Potter will be serving those detentions with Horace. Period. As for you, Mr. Malfoy, you will be spending your detentions with me."

"This is an outrage!" Narcissa shouted. "Detention! My Draco…"

"Your Draco took part in a fight that I am inclined to believe he was the one to start," McGonagall told her former student, "thus, he received exactly the same number of hours in detention as Potter did. And if I ever find proof that Mr. Malfoy did indeed try to use an _unforgivable_, I'm afraid detention will be the least of his problems."

Narcissa's usually sickly pale complexion became red with anger, so incredibly red that it contrasted heavily with her blonde hair. "This school is going more and more downhill every year. I'm leaving. Draco, walk me to the gates."

McGonagall didn't protest at her rather rude exit and Malfoy got up, not before sending a half-angry, half-threatening look at Harry, following his mother outside.

"Excuse me," Snape said. "I need to have a word with Mrs. Malfoy." And with that he left as well, leaving Sirius and Mia alone in the office along with McGonagall and Harry.

Mia was pursing her lips in frustration but tried to keep her mouth shut. Sirius was the first to notice her tension and McGonagall was quick to follow him.

"Potter, would you mind standing outside for a couple of minutes while I have a word with your godmother?" the teacher asked. It was not that she was trying to keep some sort of secret – it was just that she had a feeling she knew what Mia was going to say and her response, well, wouldn't just be something appropriate to say in front of a student…

Harry gave her a nod and motioned to stand up, heading to the door. To his surprise, though, Sirius did the same. "I'll keep him some company," his godfather told the deputy headmistress, figuring Mia could tell him whatever was spoken in there later – he just wasn't about to leave Harry alone outside the office when an angry Narcissa might still be out there ready to throw her anger at someone…

McGonagall nodded before the two of them exited. Then, she turned to look at Mia. "Alright, Mia, let it out. I know you want to."

She really, really did want to, Mia thought as she sat on the chair Harry had formerly occupied. "So, Malfoy tries to use the Cruciatus Curse on Harry and he just walks away with a pat on the head, the same days of detention as Harry and a 'don't do it again'?" Mia asked, a hint of accusation behind her voice.

"Believe me, Mia, no one is more horrified that I that a student in this school would ever try to use an unforgivable on a fellow student – even more horrified that I am inclined to believe Harry was speaking the truth." If there was one thing she was sure of, was that Harry Potter wouldn't lie about something like that. "Yet, an attempt on something is a matter hard to prove even with pensieve memories, Amelia. We might send them to the aurors but the fact that Malfoy is an underage wizard wouldn't leave them inclined to believe Harry's memory. Odds were they would say he had misunderstood the incantation."

"Can't Moaning Myrtle say something? I know she's a ghost but…"

"But if I know her well, Myrtle would have ran just as soon as a fight broke out. She probably didn't hear a thing. I'll try to find her and ask her, though," McGonagall promised. "As for the detention, I know it seems unfair they got the same number of days but my choice to have Harry spending those hours with Horace wasn't random."

"What do you mean?" Mia asked, raising an eyebrow.

"How many times do you recall Horace monitoring a detention? In your days as a student or now?" McGonagall asked.

Mia's face took a thoughtful look. Now that she mentioned it… "Never," she said. "I have no memory at all of him doing that."

"Exactly," the deputy headmistress said. "And that happens because Horace, well, has an… unorthodox way of handling detentions. Especially when the one serving it is one of his favourites, which is Harry's case."

"I don't understand," Mia said, confused.

"Well, I only recall him monitoring detentions in my first year teaching in this school – that would be Dumbledore's first year as a headmaster too – and let's just say that once he organized a small tea party to be held at the exact time of the detention so the 'poor boy who was serving it' wouldn't get bored." McGonagall sighed and shook her head. "Horace is very fond of Harry, as you know, and having him spending detention with your godson was the most I could do to make it easier on him…"

"So, you really believe him? When he said Malfoy started the fight and tried to use…?"

The other teacher sighed. "Mr. Malfoy hardly ever refrains himself from showing his nasty personality to anyone in this school. I'm afraid in my mind I could picture him doing any of the things your godson said. Besides," she added, "Harry's explanation for the fight was more extensive than his, not to mention more believable, as much as I find it hard to imagine Draco Malfoy crying over anything." The older woman sighed. "Mia, I'm telling you most of this as a fellow teacher and even as a friend. So, I'll ask you that when you talk to Harry you don't go much further than telling him I'm inclined to believe his side more easily than Malfoy's and that a detention with Horace won't be very hard to handle."

Mia nodded. "Of course. I… thank you, Minerva. For owling us before dealing with this on your own."

McGonagall nodded. "It seemed only fair. Severus went running to Narcissa as soon as he heard of what happened and, as it looked like the two of them were about to take Mr. Malfoy's side. It was only fair Harry had two people on there on his side if I wanted to remain neutral."

Mia nodded again and stood up. "Well, I think I should go, then. Sirius and Harry are waiting for me."

"Of course," the deputy headmistress replied as they started shaking hands. "And don't worry, I'll keep an eye on Malfoy to make sure he doesn't try anything."

"If anything happens…"

"… you'll be summoned right away," McGonagall promised, giving Mia a final nod before the younger woman turned around and headed to the door.

As soon as she opened it, Mia was surprised to find a furious Narcissa Malfoy just storming away from where her husband and Harry stood. Looked like the show had actually been resumed outside in her absence. Pity she hadn't been there to witness it.

**A/N: *sigh* Late again. Sorry. I was going to post this last night but then i closed my eyes for a second and fell asleep with my laptop on my lap. I get home pretty exhausted all the time now after spending all day carrying boxes of museum stuff (I'm interning at a museum, yeah) up and down, cataloguing, serving everyone above me in the work food-chain coffee and more Anyway, this chapter was getting big, really big (6,5k words), so I had to split it in two parts because there was still plenty to write. Next half would involve the half-blood-prince revelation to Sirius and Mia... Anyway, since it's halfway done, I'm hoping next week there won't be any delays. Feedback is so very welcome. Review!**


	22. Hidden Things

**Outside ****Professor McGonagall's office – a few minutes earlier**

"Sorry about the detention, kid," Sirius told his godson as he exited McGonagall's office after him, closing the door behind them. "But on a more positive note, at least it's not with Snape, which is always a victory."

"At least it ends just before the team's last Quidditch game," Harry added in relief. "They'd murder me if I couldn't make it to the game…"

"I'm sure Ginny would step in your defence before they had the chance to kill you," Sirius pointed out. "After all, she needs you alive in order to snog you."

"Are you kidding me? She'd be the one leading the angry mob towards me_,_" Harry corrected him. "She might not want to kill me but she'd at least hex me badly for missing the game. Ginny really doesn't mess around when it comes to Quidditch."

Sirius let out a fake emotional sigh. "Ah, redheads. Hair as bright as lava; fierce as a volcano." He clapped his godson's back, grinning. "Perfect for you, isn't she?" But before he could say anything else, loud voices coming from somewhere on his right on the opposite side of the hallway – a supposedly empty classroom – caught his attention.

He turned to Harry with an inquisitive expression on his face and the young boy nodded, confirming he'd heard it too. They casually took a few steps to the right until they had a visual through the open door of what was going on. "Looks like someone is hearing it," Sirius whispered to Harry, who nodded. Inside the classroom, they could see a red-faced – not from embarrassment but from anger instead – Draco Malfoy being scolded by none other than Snape.

"Am I seeing things?" Harry mumbled as he stood by his godfather's. "Is Snape actually lecturing Malfoy?"

"Seems like it." _Next thing you'll know,_ Sirius thought in disbelief, _pigs will be flying over our heads._ He wasn't close enough to hear what the scolding was about (not to mention the slight ringing sound coming from the room indicated the use of a Muffliato) but the fact that Severus Snape was giving a lecture to someone from his house, let alone Malfoy who was undoubtedly one of his favourites, was definitely… weird. Narcissa was in the room as well, though she seemed to have chosen to remain silent, only intervening from time to time – her face was blank like whatever was being discussed bothered her.

The lecturing went on for a few minutes more, growing more and more tense by the second. At some point, Draco even started to shout back at the teacher, though neither Sirius not Harry could make out his words though the Muffliato barrier… In the end of it, the youngest Malfoy stormed out of the classroom angrily and quickly disappeared from their view – he neither acknowledged Harry and Sirius, leading them to believe maybe he hadn't noticed them there, nor his own mother's voice, yelling at him to come back.

If she had looked freaked out earlier, now Narcissa seemed furious. She took it out on Snape first, yelling at him with an accusing look on her face and poking his chest with her index finger repeatedly. And then, after storming out of the classroom as her son had, she noticed her cousin's presence along with Harry's. They couldn't have been in a worse place at that moment.

From the spot where he stood, Sirius raised his eyebrows at Narcissa's staring and found it fitting to give her a mocking grin and a wave. At that, the blonde gritted her teeth and deepened her glare – and then, to Sirius's surprise, started making her way to them. _Well, damn,_ he thought – provoking her had definitely been a very bad idea…

"Keep your hand on your wand, kid, looks like we're about to get company. Let me do the talking," he told Harry under his breath, who nodded and reached for his pocket keeping his hand in it. Then, after taking a breath, Sirius took a few steps forward, towards Narcissa, hoping that it would show his cousin that she'd have to go through him if she intended to have a one-on-one with Harry.

Narcissa's eyes were blazing when she reached him and stopped only a few feet away from him. He'd known that face back when they were kids – it was her I'm-not-done-with-you-yet face. "Don't you dare stand there looking so smug," she hissed.

"You know, if the way I look bothers you, maybe you should do what normal people do: look away," he told her without humour in his voice. "Actually, do even better: go away."

"You always thought you were so good, didn't you? Defying the family, our beliefs… " she asked him with hostility. "All smug about your little blood-traitor friends and your blood-traitor new family."

It was like she was actually trying to cause a fight. _Of course she is,_ Sirius thought. Narcissa was looking for somebody to throw her anger at and there he was… might as well be wearing a bow and everything. Well, she wouldn't be so lucky with him.

"You're so proud, aren't you? That your brat," the woman continued, looking at Harry standing immobile, not a few feet behind Sirius as he had intended but instead by his godfather's side, and glared some more, "got my Draco in trouble."

"Well, not that you mention it, Cissy, yes, I am. I really am," Sirius replied matter-of-factly. "Pity all he got from trying to use an unforgivable was a week's worth of detention. But, really, keep your son going that way. Worse that can happen is him sharing a cell at Azkaban with his daddy. Speaking of which, how's Lucius enjoying the five-star treatment from the Dementors? They're a bit cold to their guests but you can't blame them – it's just their nature."

His cousin's face went even more furious and she lifted her hand, intending to slap him. He got a hold of her arm first, though, stopping her midway. "Who do you think you are to slap me? My mother?" he asked her in an ice-cold tone.

She gave him a nasty look, pulling her arm away. "Auntie couldn't have made a better choice when she kicked you out," Narcissa hissed.

His eyebrows raised in genuine surprise. He felt as amused as one could feel in the middle of a fight like that. "That's what she told you? Oh, that's just… typical. So typical. Well, sorry to destroy your illusion but _I _ran away," he told her. "Nobody kicked me out. And that is to this day one of the best choices I've ever done in my life."

Her lips pursed together and seemed to lose all the red in them. Sirius knew that look too – wounded pride or at least something close to it. She seemed tempted to leave but what was left of that pride wouldn't let her walk away without having the last word in that fight. Her eyes aimed at Harry, seeing as she had no more stones to throw at Sirius, and she glared. "You stay away from my son, Potter." And then, Narcissa Malfoy walked away before giving either the chance to respond.

"Why doesn't she tell her precious son to do the same?" Harry mumbled under his breath as the woman walked away in a superior fashion, apparently returning to the classroom where she, Snape and Draco had been having their dispute in order to get the things she'd left behind. He turned to his godfather, whispering. "Was she always this…?" He gestured in frustration with his hands, unable to find a word suitable enough to define her.

Instead, Sirius came up with several. "Superior? Bitchy? Snobbish? A pain in the arse?" Sirius suggested. "Take your pick."

"Merlin, you sure have a lot of names to qualify her," Harry mumbled.

"Narcissa has always inspired me in what came to profanity," he informed his godson. "But, answering your question, yeah, she was always like that, though the reasons for it varied along the years. See, when we were kids, she was also insufferable all the time as she thought she was the best because she was blonde and nobody else in the family was. Said she was 'gifted'," he stated, rolling his eyes. "I say she's blonde because Auntie Druella went apple-picking outside of the family orchard, if you know what I mean…" And just as if he'd been timing it, Narcissa exited the classroom again, carrying a horrid crocodile-skin bag along with her right when he was about to finish his statement. Because he felt daring at that moment, Sirius raised his voice a few decibels when he spoke again making sure his words came out just as she was walking past them. "Maybe it is no coincidence that out of that wretched brood, Andromeda was the only one that came out normal."

Narcissa only hurried her pace as she walked away, not looking at Harry nor Sirius as she muttered something about Bellatrix teaching him a lesson someday soon, which made Sirius bite his own lip.

"What did I just miss?" the two of them heard Mia's familiar voice asking from behind them. Both turned around to see her watching Narcissa's retreating from McGonagall's doorway with a confused look on her face.

"Nothing worth witnessing," Sirius told her shortly. "Cissy and I only had a mild exchange of words."

"And she tried to slap Sirius," Harry pointed out.

Mia nodded, an unconvinced look on her face. "Awfully mild, I see."

Her husband shrugged. "It was nothing." Discretely, he reached with his hand to touch hers, recalling how upset she'd seemed earlier. "Are you okay?"

She nodded. "I'm fine," she replied shortly before turning to Harry. "Let's go to the kitchens. I suppose we should have a little chat in private."

Harry swallowed hard in a way that made his already aching lip, product of his altercation with Malfoy, sting in an even more uncomfortable way. "In how much trouble am I, really?"

Mia shook her head. "None with me, actually," Mia replied with a sigh. "I don't expect you not to defend yourself when some spoiled bratty kid attacks you. And speaking of which…" she said, her eyes fixed on his split lip. She used her hand to shift his jaw slightly to its left, where the cut was. "That ought to be painful."

"Just hurts a little," he said bravely.

She shook her head. "Don't be silly."Mia reached for her wand and pointed it at the cut. Harry didn't need to think twice in order to recognize the healing spell Mia whispered – back when he and Izzy were little, his godmother using it to fix their scraped knees and elbows was as much part of their routine as bathing or having breakfast. "Most of it is healed but it will still feel tender."

"Sounds like there will be no snogging with our favourite redhead for the next few days," Sirius told him in a mocking tone as they started walking towards the kitchens.

They reached the main staircase and made their way down to the entrance hall before taking the usual way to the kitchens through the little door behind the Great Staircase. The proceedings were also the usual from then on, involving Sirius tickling the pear in the large fruit bowl portrait that covered the entrance to the kitchens, which opened to let them in.

Mia gestured towards a table in the corner and Sirius and Harry followed her there. They sat, unnoticed by most of the elves that too were busy cooking and preparing dozens of platters for the dinner banquet that was to happen around three hours from then to mind them. When Harry tried to place on a chair the book-bag he'd been carrying all that time, which was getting rather heavy on his shoulder, he missed it by a few inches and it fell down, sprawling his books all over the floor. "Oh, damn it," he cursed under his breath, reaching down to the floor to pick up the books. Before he could pick them all up, Sirius leaned down too and picked one of them, bringing it up. It was his copy of _'Advanced Potion-Making'_, Harry realized with a gulp – seemed like his secret weapon to triumph in potions about to be revealed.

"Blimey, kid," Sirius mumbled, noticing the heavy scribble all over the textbook's margins as he placed it opened on their table. "Have you been possessed by Moony or Hermione to take this many notes?"

"Er… I…" He had no idea what to say.

"Let me see that," Mia requested, getting a hold of it. It didn't take her long to look up at Harry and raise an eyebrow. "This is not your handwriting."

"Ah, the typical the-exams-are-starting-in-two-weeks-let-me-borrow-all-your-notes act," Sirius concluded. "Classic. Don't be ashamed, Harry, we've all done that. Some more than most"

It would have been so easy to just go along and not tell them that was actually his book… or rather the book that he'd switched with his real one because it had oh-so-great notes all over it that made him for once do anything decent in his potions class… But going along would have been lying and, Merlin, after the issue with the Horcruxes, he couldn't just do it flat to Sirius and Mia's faces. Worse that could happen by telling the truth was him getting a lecture… and well, Mia taking the book away by using the same logic Hermione did and assuming it was cheating… But it was still the right thing to do. He gulped once and spoke. "Actually," he said, "that's my book."

Mia raised her eyebrows. "Than whose handwriting is this? It's not Ron's or Hermione's. I've corrected enough of their essays to know that. So whose is it?"

"I don't really know," he confessed. "Those notes were already in the book when I got it."

She raised her eyebrows. "When you got it?" she asked as Sirius got a hold of the book again and started examining its pages. "That book came straight from Flourish & Blots months ago and I'm pretty sure they don't sell books that have stuff written by hand all over them."

"Well…" Harry started. "Remember how I thought that because I got an E in Potions, I wouldn't be able to attend the NEWT level class because Snape only accepted people with an O in his class so we didn't get me a textbook for it?" He said that part awfully fast, causing Sirius and Mia to only make some sense out of what he'd said a few seconds later, just as he continued. "And how it turned out that after all Slughorn took over the class, he let me in it so I had to borrow an old textbook from his stash?"

Sirius looked up from the pages he was reading for a moment. "I'm gonna take a wild guess and say this is actually the book you borrowed and not the one we got you later," he said, finding Harry's storing rather intriguing in a good way.

Harry nodded slowly and turned to his godmother. "Er… sorry?"

"Oh, no you're not," Mia replied, her eyes narrowing. "Why on Earth would you switch an old book for a new one?"

"Because this book is bloody brilliant," Sirius replied before his godson had a chance to speak, pushing the open book in front of Mia. "It has instructions all over, tricks, tips… stuff that makes your life a lot easier."

Mia covered her face with her hands and huffed. "Aw, Harry," she said in frustration. "So that whole success at Potions… it was actually cheating?"

It was almost like hearing Hermione's lecturing all over again. "Not _cheating_. I was just… following slightly different recipes than the ones the other people were."

Mia didn't seem very convinced while Sirius… well, he didn't seem to see anything wrong about the book, so fascinated he was with it. "Merlin, I would have killed to have a book like this one. It would've saved me a lot of trouble…" he mumbled as if he were a kid delighted with a new Christmas present.

That one had Harry confused. "Trouble? According to McGonagall, you aced at most of the subjects without really trying," Harry replied, his eyebrow raised.

"'Most' being the keyword. Potions was by far my worst subject, which is probably related to the fact that most of my cooking experiences involve coal-like food in the end…" he mused, giving Mia a shippish look that made her roll her eyes. "But, Merlin, I was _bad_ at potions. There was this time during class in my fifth year when the fumes of a potion actually burned out your father's eyebrows."

Harry stared, his mouth hanging open. "No way. I don't believe it. Neville is bad at Potions and not even he has done something like _that_," he said in disbelief.

Mia sighed, allowing herself to let go of the cheating matter for just a little and relax. "It's true," she confirmed, turning to her husband. "Though I'll point that it had less to do with your lack of knack for potions and more with the fact that you were busy playing hangman with…" she paused for a moment, recalling it had been Wormtail that Sirius had been disytracted with, and chose not to say his name out loud. "You were playing hangman instead of paying attention to your potion."

Sirius seemed to remember that too as he tensed, even though she hadn't said the traitor's name out loud. He did his best not to let it bother him, though. "It might have had something to do with that," he admitted, clearing his throat and looking back down at the book, rummaging through the pages some more in silence.

"But Harry, about you using that textbook…" Mia started.

"You don't think it's a good idea," Harry guessed easily.

"Can you even imagine who wrote all those notes, Harry?"

"Sort of," he said. "It says on the last page of the book that it belongs to some bloke who calls himself the Half-Blood Prince."

"The Half-Blood Prince?" Mia asked sceptically.

"The kid is right. It's right here," Sirius declared as he opened the book, showing its last page to Mia. The words were clear in it: _This book is the property of the Half-Blood Prince_. "That must have been a cocky bloke to call himself a prince…"

"Harry, you know there's no royalty in the Wizarding World," Mia said, then.

"I know but…" He sighed. "Look, whoever it belonged to, this book – the notes in it – saved Ginny's life. If it didn't say that a Bezoar could fight most sorts of poison, I wouldn't have used it back in March when she was poisoned and she would have died. I also know it's not cursed because I had Hermione checking it herself and if she said it didn't have dark magic, it's because it didn't – she doesn't like the book much either."

"Still, Harry…" Mia started before sighing and pausing, letting a long moment of silence flow, leaving both her and Harry awfully uncomfortable. There were just so many reasons for her not to let him keep that book…

"Hey. What's this spell? I never heard of it," Sirius said at some point, pointing at a specific piece of scribble on one of the books' pages. It said _Sectumsempra_, a word that was followed by little note, pointing out that it was meant to be used on enemies.

Harry shook his head. "I don't know. I never tried it."

Both his godparents looked at him in surprise. "You never tried it?" Mia asked, astonished. That was so unlike Harry: as much as she told him to be cautious, he usually always ended up giving in to curiosity instead…

"Not even in a tree or something just to see what it does?" His godfather added, receiving a head-shake in return. "Why not?"

Harry sighed. "It's a long story."

"Well, shorten it up, then," Sirius urged him.

He looked at them uncertainly at first but then went ahead and spoke. "It's Ginny," he told them. "At first she freaked out about me using the book. I mean, you now what the diary did to her – it's pretty understandable she'd freak out over me using a book that told me what to do. After Hermione checked it and it turned out not to have any dark magic in it, Ginny calmed down a little but just in case, she asked me to promise her that I wouldn't use any spell or any weird ingredient in it that book that I didn't know already and wasn't mentioned in any regular textbook."

"And you kept that promise," Mia finished for him, her lips curling slightly – somehow knowing he'd done that for Ginny eased some of her doubts about the book…

"I figured that even though it might be really fun to use that spell on Malfoy and cause his toenails to burst into flames or something, it wouldn't be worth it if the cost was having Ginny freaking out over it…"

Sirius just looked at him for a few moments, his arms crossed over his chest. "Boy, you're really arse over elbow in love with that one, aren't you?" he observed.

His godson blushed slightly even though he knew that already.

"Alright," Mia started in a conclusive tone. "So, the book is not cursed and it helped Ginny. I get it, Harry, I really do. But even if I'm willing to let you get away with it as your godmother," and she wasn't all that much, "as teacher I simply can't ."

"Why not?" he asked in a mumble. "Wait, are you going to tell Slughorn…"

"For all intents and purposes, outside this kitchen I'll have no knowledge of you ever using that book before today," she assured him at first. "But I can't let you keep it. If you used it in your exam, it would be cheating. You know it would, Harry."

"So I have to get rid of it?" Harry asked weakly, his hand reaching protectively for the book – he really didn't want to do that after all the help the Prince had provided him with.

"We could just take it home and let you have it back when the year is over," Sirius suggested – he found the book too brilliant to end up in a trashcan… He turned to his wife. "We could, couldn't we?"

Mia sighed. "Alright. We could do that," she accepted before looking at Harry. "Honey, you know it's the right thing to do. I'll be damned if you can't ace that potions exam without some smartarse book with a few more instructions than the other ones. That 'E' you got at Potions didn't come out of thin air. You don't need to cheat to be good at potions."

Harry sighed. She did seem to have a point. "Alright," he said, handing his godmother his copy of '_Advanced Potion-Making_'. "But I'll still need a textbook for the rest of the year and I can't get the one I switched for this one. I mean, Slughorn keeps the books in his ingredient stash and he always keeps it closed. Either I'd have to break in to get it or ask him for it – Merlin knows he'd start asking questions if I did…"

"Well," Sirius suggested. "I do know where your father's old book is, if you're interested. It's right in this school, by the way."

Harry's face turned to him in surprise. "It is?"

Sirius nodded. "James sort of had this end-of-the-year ritual. First thing he'd do right after his last exam was grabbing the books he wouldn't use anymore and dumping them in the Room of Requirement's place to hide things, hoping to never lay eyes on them again. His old Potions book is most likely there too and if you want it, it's yours."

"Thanks," Harry said, a small smile on his face. Sure, he was still a bit annoyed for having to let go of the Prince's book but it seemed like a pretty good deal getting his father's old one instead…

"Great, let's get it now," Sirius said eagerly, motioning to get up before his wife stopped him.

"Wait," she said. "We were supposed to come down here to talk about Harry's fight with Malfoy, weren't we?" Mia turned to her godson. "And there's no way I'm letting you walk away without at least telling us what you were actually doing to 'run into' Malfoy in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Because I don't buy it the way you said it."

"Oh," Harry mumbled. Sometimes she could see right through him so well that it was… well, it was scary. "I… I was watching him through the Marauder's map. Just to see if he would vanish from the map again, that is. I couldn't help going to check what the guy was doing just when he walked into a _girl's bathroom_ alone. I didn't know he was weeping."

"What were you expecting to find him doing? Cosmetic charms in front of a mirror?" Mia asked in return. "I'm not going to say you shouldn't go on those spying missions because there's just no use doing it – but you still shouldn't go alone, Harry."

"If Ron or Hermione had been with you, they'd have had your back," Sirius agreed with his wife. "Not to mention it would have been much easier to prove he had actually tried to use the Cruciatus curse on you…"

"If I took Veritaserum…"

"Kid, as long as you believe in something, Veritaserum would deem it as the truth," Sirius told him. "They could have just said that, because you felt threatened by Malfoy, you imagined one of the curses he used to be an unforgivable. Do you realize how many suspected Death Eaters have pull within the Wizengamot? Malfoy would be protected in there…"

Harry huffed. "Well, seems like I'll just have to get used to another week of detention…"

"McGonagall believes you," Mia told him. "That's why she arranged for you to serve detention with Slughorn – apparently his detentions are a joke. She won't be so nice with Malfoy."

"Still sucks," Harry mumbled.

"Aw, get that pout out of your face, kid," Sirius told him, clapping his back. "See the positive side: Malfoy is serving _detention with McGonagal_. She can be really mean when she's pissed off. Believe me, I know. Once made me scrub the whole floor of the Great Hall by hand. Took me days to finish it."

Harry sighed. "Let's hope she has him scrubbing every toilet in the castle instead," he mumbled.

* * *

When the door of the room of requirement – now acting as the room of hidden things – opened, Harry's jaw nearly dropped. It's size seemed to have tripled and inside the large room, there hundreds… no, thousands of the most varied sort of objects one could possibly imagine.

"Neat, isn't it?" Sirius asked with a grin as he stepped in after Harry and closed the door behind him. Having ran into Izzy on their way up, Mia had stayed back chatting with her daughter while the two of them took care of getting the book in the room of requirement.

"Merlin, I'm pretty sure this place is even a bigger mess than it used to be," Sirius mumbled under his breath as he had to step over what seemed to be a birdcage in order to make his way to where he believed his late best-mate's books to be. "You should probably be careful while wondering around here," Sirius told his godson, knowing he was following him. "You never know what could jump on you coming from a pile of rubbish."

"You think there's… living stuff in here?" Harry said, stopping as he stood in front of some mysterious cabinet – likely one of many in that room…

Sirius turned around and shrugged. "Who knows? I mean, nothing happened to me or the guys when we were in here but it's probably safer to have your wand in hand just in case if you're planning on exploring or something while I try to find your father's books in here. If something does jump on you, well, yell."

Harry narrowed his eyes. "You're joking about the jumping, right?"

His godfather grinned. "Guess you'll have to wait to find out."

Harry being Harry couldn't help the urge to actually explore, though he was cautious to keep himself close to his godfather, not more than a few yards out of his view. There really were all sorts of stuff in there: moving portraits; a skeleton of a five-legged thing; creepy-looking jars that, Harry saw at a distance, had things floating in them… And then his eyes landed something golden and sparkly: it was a diadem.

What such a valuable piece of jewellery was doing in that room was something he couldn't phantom… It was carelessly shoved into a half-open drawer of a damaged dresser and Harry couldn't help feeling temped to get a closer look at it. He pulled the drawer further open and reached with his hand to grab the diadem from inside it.

When his fingers touched the jewelled piece, he felt a sudden excruciating pain in his scar. It felt like someone had just showed a knife into his forehead. For a moment, he thought that whatever had happened to Katie Bell after touching the cursed necklace in the beginning of that year was happening to him too – yet, that thought slipped out of his mind when he was able to pull his hand away from the diadem and the pain vanished. He had no idea of what had just happened but it occurred to him that maybe he should think twice before touching pieces of jewellery from unknown sources again.

"_Ah, found'em_!" Sirius's voice echoed in the room, making Harry's attention snap back to him. "_Harry, did you get lost_?"

"No, I…" he paused and walked towards the source of his godfather's voice, finding him only a few yards away, lifting what seemed to be a heavy box made out of paper and placing it on top of an arch. "I'm here."

Sirius raised an eyebrow when he saw him. "You okay, kid? You look kind of pale."

"I'm fine," Harry said almost too fast. "I was just… people hide weird stuff in here."

"Oh, let me guess: you ran into that jar full of pickled eyeballs," Sirius said, making a disgusted face. "I was almost sick when I saw that one too." He shook his head, looking down as he opened the paper box and cleared the dust out of the air. "Merlin, there were some freaks in this school…"

"Yeah," Harry mumbled, glad to have an excuse for his paleness other than his odd reaction to the golden diadem. He approached the box and saw dozens of books in it: there were textbooks starting from the first-year charms manual to a runes dictionary. He'd used half those titles himself, which made him feel strangely… connected. They seemed something so insignificant… his father's school-books. Yet just looking at them felt so important to him – his father had actually touched those books, studied then….

Sirius rummaged trough the box until he found the book he was looking for. "Here it is. A copy of '_Advanced Potion-Making_'. Use it well, mate."

As he handed it to the Harry, a crumpled piece of parchment fell down from the book and Harry reached down and picked it up. It seemed to be one of those little notes one passed in class and, from the looks of it, it had circled between his parents. The first line, written in a boyish messy handwriting had '_Wanna be my date to Hogsmeade this weekend, Evans?' _written on it, to which another handwriting, this one neat, responded. '_How about the one that falls on the 30__th__ and 31__st__ of February instead?_'. Harry snorted as he read his father's clearly annoyed response saying '_Very Funny_' and then his mother replying by telling him to stop passing notes and pay attention to class.

"Well, that's pretty much the sentiment of Lily and James: the early years," Sirius said with a chuckle as he read the note over Harry's shoulder. "Tell you what, how about I go ahead and take this box home so you can check it for more pearls like that one when you have a little more time?" Sirius suggested, understanding just how important those little things might be for his godson.

"I think I'd like that," he said, folding back the little note and putting it back inside the potions book carefully. "We should probably go. Aunt Mia is waiting."

Sirius nodded and closed the box of books again, shrinking it with his wand to a smaller size and putting it in his pocket. "Let's go – I guess we're done here."

And as they left, Harry didn't give another thought to that mysterious diadem he's so unpleasantly ran into earlier. Little did he know that less than a year later, he'd be desperately trying to find it again…

**A/N: Came late again, sorry. I went out for the weekend - spent a little time at the beach... Anyway, here it is, the new chapter. Hope you noticed some 'easter eggs' in the middle, hinting for future things... Feedback is always welcome! Review!**


	23. Troubled

**A/N: First of all, sorry about the later chapter guys but there was no way around it. Second of all, this chapter is dedicated to my little sister and very first fan, Belle whose birthday is today! (Features her favourite character and namesake as requested)**

The second day of June started out promising it would be a lazy day for Sirius and by mid afternoon it seemed to be willing to keep that promise up. No owls bringing worrying messages, no floo-calls fetching them somewhere and leave them stuck there for hours… just a Saturday – no, a weekend – in all its glory. So much glory, Sirius mused, that he feared that just by thinking it was so glorious he might jinx it and he definitely didn't want that.

If he was honest, he'd have to admit that week-days weren't that much of a pain for him. His work at Hogwarts couldn't be farther from stressing, after all: besides the flying lessons, a few hours aiding the house teams every week and occasionally keeping an eye on the Defence Club for Dumbledore, he had plenty of time for himself. Only bad thing about that: Mia was usually busy during those many free hours of his and without her around, well, his wide range of activities to occupy his time, so to speak, were narrowed down to little more than half a dozen different choices that weren't half as exciting… Pitiful how ninety percent of the entertaining activities that would run through his mind were based on Mia… undressed if possible, he thought sheepishly.

He didn't have the time to feel bad for his thoughts as suddenly he felt something wet and sticky splashing him on the face, followed by a baby coo.

There was a five second pause during which Sirius registered what happened before he slowly turned his face down to his lap, where his youngest daughter (whom he was supposed to have been finishing feeding her mid-afternoon meal) sat supported by his arm. There, Mary Black was apparently entertained with sticking her tiny hand into her mouth. A hand, he observed, that had clearly found its way into the apple mash bowl that he'd placed on the chair next to his for a moment while lost in thought, splashing the gooey substance all over his face, her own and the nearby furniture – no doubt, if it wasn't for Kreacher's habit of using basic stain repelling charms on everyone's clothing when doing the laundry, his clothes and the baby's would have been added to that list of casualties.

"You think that was funny, don't you?" he asked the baby, who replied with a look as confused as a five-month-old could manage after her father carefully moved the bowl of food to somewhere out of her arm-waving radius. "Like to see Daddy with food all over his face, hum?" He shook his head with eyes narrowed in disapproval and pointed her finger at her warningly. "Bad baby."

It was pretty obvious Mary hadn't understood the scolding since she innocently gave her father a radiant smile and giggled, reaching up to his arm with her food covered little hand, making his heart melt a little.

Sirius sighed and couldn't help smiling back as he reached for a napkin lying on the kitchen table that he used to clean his daughter's tiny hand. "How's it possible for you to make such a mess being as small as you are? No, worse, how can someone possibly stay angry at you, little girl?" he asked – not expecting any answer – as he cleaned some splashes of apple mash that had landed on her face before taking care of removing the gooey substance from his own face, nevertheless missing several of the splash residues. Sirius sighed. "You're going to give me trouble one day, aren't you?If I'm not careful, one of these days you'll show up on my doorstep with some brainless punk telling me you two want to elope in the Maldives and all it will take for me to book and pay you the portkeys myself will be that smile of yours …" He shook his head and looked down at Mary, sighing. "There should be some sort of way for you babies to stay babies forever."

Mary cooed and shoved her little hand back into her mouth to chew it, looking up at her father with wide open observing brown eyes that matched her mothers' in every way Sirius could think of.

As he felt himself melt a little more, Sirius sighed. "I'm so doomed," he murmured as the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs that connected the kitchen to the upper floors reached his ears. When he shifted his hold on Mary and turned his face to the door, Mia was stepping into the room and getting ready to place Alex on the floor, which the little boy seemed to be rather happy about, running straight to Kreacher, who'd been busy doing Merlin knew what by the kitchen sink.

"Have you finished feeding her already?" Mia asked casually, distracted with keeping one eye on their son just to make sure he was entertained with the house-elf.

"Practically, yeah," Sirius told his wife as she turned to look back at him. Suddenly, an amused look seemed to cover her face, which made Sirius raise a suspicious eyebrow. "What are you grinning at?"

She approached the chair where he sat and settled herself on the one next to his. "I was just observing my husband's handsome face. I mean, handsome when it doesn't have unidentified substances all over it," his wife told him, chuckling.

It took him a fragment of a second to realize what she meant. "Oh, that… well, you can blame it your daughter," he replied, nodding down at the baby on his lap. "Mary here thought it was funny to give herself and Daddy and apple mash facial. Does wonders to your skin."

The smile only widened on Mia's face as she reached for a napkin. "I'm sure it will revolutionize the cosmetic industry. Here, let me take care of it. Turn your face sideways," she commanded to her husband, who promptly obeyed, allowing her to swipe the little splashes of food from his face.

"You done?" he asked her several seconds later as she pulled the napkin away from his face.

She pretended to consider it. "No, not quite yet. Look at me."

He did as she said and, seconds later, saw her placing the napkin down on the table and reaching with her hands for his face, cupping it before she leaned towards him and touched his lips softly with her own. The kiss lasted for several seconds – maybe minutes even – and tasted, as always, sweeter than the best treat he'd ever had. Just like it had as long as he could remember kissing her. It's was Mary's annoyed whimper on her father's lap that made them break apart a few seconds later.

"Okay, I think I'm done now," she whispered against his lips.

"You sure?" he asked, feeling rather feisty. "I think Mary here can handle a few more seconds before resorting to full-blown crying to get our attention. I think I still have a little bit of apple mash right here." He pointed at his own lips for illustration and grinned.

Mia chuckled and gave him a quick peck there instead, which was far from what he intended. "Let's not risk it. We both know she can be pretty loud if she wants to," she told her husband before pulling further away from him in order to look down at the annoyed little girl and pick her up, holding her against her chest while she rubbed her little back.

Sirius groaned, pouting half-heartedly before he noticed something else on the opposite side of the counter: Alex trying to reach up the kitchen counter in order to lay his hands on the cookie jar. Chuckling, Sirius stood up and motioned to approach the culprit. "You know, mate, you either need to figure out chairs are handy objects to climb on when you want to reach high stuff or to grow a few more inches to get your hands on the cookies."

Alex squealed and looked up at his father with a grin that so closely matched his. "I wanna cookie, Daddy!" the little boy asked.

"What's the magic word, mate?" Sirius asked him back.

"Chauwclat cookie!"

"I think what your Mom keeps telling you to say is 'please' but never mind it," he replied dryly, picking his son up from the floor and reaching inside the cookie jar to fetch one for his son. "Don't tell your mother I gave you that."

Mia snorted from her seat. "That might actually work if I wasn't sitting six feet away and watching you feed junk to our son."

Sirius turned and gave her a shameless grin, getting a cookie for himself too. "They taste too good to be junk, love. Want one?" he offered, putting the little boy back on the floor.

She sighed, knowing that was a hopeless matter, and dropped it, changing the subject. "Elizabeth owled earlier inviting us for dinner today at the Leaky Cauldron with her and her kids," Mia told him, placing Mary down on her push chair, allowing little Alex to stand by it, watching his baby sister which he seemed to still find highly intriguing as, from time to time, he could go on doing it for hours.

Sitting back, Sirius groaned for several reasons. "Today? I thought today was supposed to be our lazy day. We'd just stay in the house enjoying a little time with the kids and then when they were napping enjoy a little time on our own."

Mia rolled her eyes. "Isn't a lazy morning enough for you? Because I'm pretty sure that only leaving the bedroom after eleven because Mary was crying her lungs out classifies this morning as lazy."

"I dunno if it's a good idea, Mia. I mean, are you intending to take the kids too? In case you don't know, the Quidditch League finals are today and, if I recall it well, the Leaky tends to get pretty crowded with the people celebrating afterwards. Doesn't seem like a great place for two kids under three-years-old."

"Well, I'm sure we'll be out of there by the time the game is over but I guess you're probably right about it not being a good idea taking the kids and risk us getting stuck in the celebrations…"

"So, what? We leave them with Lulu?"

She shook her head. "She and Gabe are out for the weekend and I definitely don't want to contact her unless it's an emergency. Molly's been asking me for weeks to let her borrow the kids, though. I'm pretty sure she won't mind watching them for the evening today," she said, giving him a little smile – one they scarcely missed was babysitters, thank Merlin. "Come on, Sirius. Today looks like a pretty good day, prefect for us to go out for a walk outside."

"Except it's cloudy all over," he replied.

It was cloudy all the time, now that he mentioned it. And that brought him back to the main reason why he was reluctant to go out. Muggles blamed the constant cloudy weather on the climate, Wizards, though, knew better, and blamed it on the dozens of Dementors lurking around London. Last sighting had been only a couple of days before not far from St. Paul's Cathedral and the aurors had needed to intervene in order to keep one of them from kissing a barmy homeless bloke. It was a miracle nobody had their soul stolen yet. Or at least that there was no record of it. Summer was three weeks away and those bastards had even taken the sun away… They were the reason why it had been a few weeks since he, Mia or the kids had last walked around muggle or wizarding London. And knowing that, he simply hated how those… faceless Dementor bastards could freak him out and make him feel like a bloody coward.

"Well, it's not getting much better than this, Sirius," Mia replied, her voice tense as she spoke. "It's actually warm enough to walk outside with your arms bare, which is more than we can say about the past few weeks."

"I know, love, it's just…"

She rested her hand on top of his on the table. It was time for her to be the one to comfort him. "Sirius," she started, "I know you have reasons to hate and to fear the Dementors more than anyone else I know." It gave her the chills to think of how he'd been so close to be kissed by one if Harry hadn't helped him escape back when Sirius was on the run. "I really understand. But we can't stop going outside in London just because some of them have been sighted lately. It's not healthy and, honestly, it feels sort of like you're letting them win by avoiding them."

It annoyed him that she was right in every word and it annoyed him even more than he hadn't figured out her conclusion on his own…

"Besides," she continued, "you know Kingsley has aurors stationed all over Diagon Alley for protection. I'm pretty sure if they managed to pass their auror training, they must be decent enough making a Patronus. As both of us are, by the way. So, knock it off because I'm going to floo Molly now and ask her to keep the kids and intend to be out of this house in a half hour."

He raised an eyebrow. "Wait, I thought you'd said dinner. It's four in the afternoon – a bit early, isn't it?"

"I did say dinner," she confirmed casually. "But I was counting on you being a gentleman, Mr. Black, and entertain your wife around Diagon Alley for a little bit. Plus, I haven't seen Elizabeth in weeks, so she'd meeting us there at half past five. We need to catch up, don't we?"

"Oh, so I have to give up my lazy afternoon in order to go to Diagon Alley _and _follow you and Elizabeth around while you catch up?" Sirius asked in a sceptical tone. "I'll take a wild guess and say you'd drag me there if you had to, wouldn't you?"

Mia smiled at him, absently helping Alex climb up to her lap as he turned his attention back to his parents. "Sure – I've already sent the owl back saying we're going and everything. Don't act likr it will be a bummer for you. Doesn't Remus work on Saturdays? You can hang out with him while Elizabeth and I spend time together. I doubt you're willing to let such a good opportunity to make a few sexual jokes about him and Tonks slide by so easily."

That last part made him chuckle in amusement. "It wouldn't be like me to ignore that, would it?" he agreed. And now that he thought of it, it did seem interesting… Now that Remus had already gotten married to Tonks, he kind of missed tormenting him for that purpose… All that was left were the you're-shagging-my-cousin jokes. "Alright, I suppose I can live with that arrangement – as long as I receive the proper payment for such later, Mrs. Black," he added suggestively.

"I'll be sure to bake you a pie later, then," she joked, reaching to place a kiss on his cheek and then another one on her little son's, making him giggle and call her 'Mama'.

"Not the kind of payment I was referring to," Sirius pointed out, forcing a frown.

She rolled her eyes. "I'll take that under consideration, depending on the quality of your company this afternoon. Now lighten up. You'll see this will only improve the day – a lazy afternoon wouldn't be half as fun."

Yet, unknowingly to them, no matter what they did in their afternoon, that day would always be remembered by the dark events that would take place later that night.

* * *

"I hate this, I hate this, I hate this," Izzy Black said as she closed her Muggle studies book with a little too much force as she and Ginny studied together in the Gryffindor common room. Although neither was terribly keen to do so, they had no choice with yet another OWL coming up just a couple of days away.

Ginny figured she might as well use that time before Harry came back from his detention with Snape, whose reason was too stupid for her to remember, followed by a meeting with Dumbledore to study as Hermione had been lecturing her about never taking a break to focus on her studies. She had to remind herself that Hermione was at the library with Ron in order to keep the lecture from playing in her head again. "You hate Muggle Studies?" she asked her best friend, unsure after she heard her statement.

"No, I actually like Muggle Studies. What I hate is that we have to know some stupid Muggle economics theories! What sense does it make that I have to know about Muggle economics when I don't even know, or care for that matter, about Wizarding ones? And you want to know what I hate even more than that? OWLs. They're stupid."

"Did you know that usually when you're frustrated about something you tend to start insulting it?" Ginny observed out loud as she closed her book too, causing Izzy to give her a far from amused look in return. "Anyway," she continued, "you should probably know that the twins share your pain and your beliefs. Well, _shared_, actually, back when they were taking their OWLs."

"I didn't know they had taken Muggle studies," Izzy stated.

"Oh, they did, not that they are as interested in the subject as Dad. Let's say their criteria to pick their optional subjects wasn't based on how interesting they sounded," Ginny explained. "They picked Care for Magical Creatures because they figured they could see some wicked creatures that might come handy for their business in the future in there and Muggle Studies because Fred had a… let's call it crush on Professor Burbage."

Izzy snorted at the simple thought. "Really? Professor Burbage? She's old enough to be you guys' mom."

"I know," she said, reminiscent. "But he thought she had the nicest pair of legs he'd ever seen in his thirteen-year-long life and other equally interesting pairs, if you know what I mean. I don't even know how he knew if these looked good or not since her teacher robes generally cover plenty… Anyway, seeing as he wanted to keep admiring her… attributes, he signed up for the class and of course George followed."

"He didn't have a crush on Burbage too?"

Ginny shook her head. "They may be twins but they usually don't go for the exact same type of girl. See Fred for an example: he likes warrior-like girls. Exotic in a way, stubborn, bossy… pretty much the way they describe the amazons without the man-hating trait – just like Angelina and, well, Professor Burbage too. You see that look she gets when everyone's talking during her class – you can almost expect her to grab a bow and aim an arrow to someone's forehead so they'll shut up."

Izzy nodded. "I guess that does have a point. And what about George?" she asked, suddenly curious. "How different is his type?"

"Well, It's hard to describe – he hasn't dated much lately and, when he does, it rarely lasts long enough for me to even meet her – the biggest references I have are his Hogwarts-time girls and their cashier at the shop, Varity, that he went out with once last year. He goes for the smart, friendly type if you take Varity under consideration. Also brave and a bit daring too since here at Hogwarts he mostly went for Gryffindors. It's hard to say for sure… sometimes it's not that clear and only the person in question can define it. Like you, for example."

"Me?" she asked.

"Sure. Earlier this year you told me your ideal guy would be someone that could make you laugh by being himself. I suppose that defines a type for you. And you're also finding closer fits to it, if you take the," she cleared her throat and lowered her voice, "most recent events under consideration. Or should I be more specific and say the words 'Seamus' and 'Finnigan'? I still can't believe you snogged him. I know in normal circumstances he'd a pretty funny bloke but you know he has a thing for Lavender. I was under the impression you'd gotten pickier at blokes lately."

"It was just _once_ at the party after you won the Quidditch House Cup. Can you blame us? We were festive."

"Yeah, and half of you were also tipsy on Butterbeer."

"He was just chatty-tipsy," she replied. "We only snogged for five minutes until you walked in on us and then we decided it just didn't feel right, so we talked instead. He was really sweet – even thanked me for my mom letting his grandparents keep the Wales house after what happened to his parents… But why am I even telling you this? I'm not the one who got detention for inappropriate behaviour with Harry under the bleachers right after the game!"

"Snape exaggerated it!" Ginny replied, blushing slightly at the memory. _That_ had been some snogging with the whole adrenaline of the game pumping through their veins…

"Not that much, judging from your blush," Izzy pointed out casually, making her friend glare. "I don't suppose I need to hear a description of your type of bloke. Let me guess: brave, way too selfless, messy black hair, green eyes and a lightening bold-shaped scar on his forehead?"

The redhead chuckled. "Well, I found just the perfect fit, didn't I? And speaking of whom…" Ginny whispered as she saw her boyfriend stepping into the Common Room through the portrait hole, his face incredibly pale. She stood up immediately, as did Izzy. "Harry, what's wrong? You look awfully pale." He kept walking and, for a moment, she wondered if he'd gone deaf… and blind for that matter since she was staying only a few feet away from him and he wouldn't answer. "Harry!"

At her shout, he turned his face to her for a moment and nodded towards the spiral staircase leading up to his dorm, telling her to go up.

Ginny turned to Izzy, then. "Give us a moment," she said, receiving a short nod in return from her equally confused friend. When she turned to the spiral staircase, Harry's feet were already disappearing up the stairs and she quickly followed him, wondering what all the hurry could be about. Her gut told her it couldn't be good – it never was. Seemed like the trouble that happened every school year always converged to those last weeks right by the end of it, causing some sort of catastrophe or massive trouble to happen… She had a feeling it was almost inevitable that whatever had gotten Harry in such a hurry was the beginning of said catastrophe.

Harry was kneeling on the floor, his hands rummaging through his possessions in his trunk when Ginny entered the dorm. He looked up at her immediately. "Close the door," he told her.

Ginny nodded and did so, approaching her boyfriend's tense form, then. "Harry, what the hell is happening? Tell me anything! Is this about that meeting Dumbledore called after your detention?"

"Partially, yes," he told her, his eyes fixed in the trunk. "I haven't got much time. Dumbledore thinks I'm just getting my Invisibility Cloak."

"Well, get on with it, then," she urged him.

He stood up, then, apparently bringing the invisibility cloak from inside the trunk and placing it on his bed. "Dumbledore found a Horcrux and we're going to get it."

"Right now?" she asked.

He nodded. "Right now."

"Okay. Alright," she mumbled. "That's good, right? There will be one less Horcrux for you to worry about after tonight…"

"Yeah, but that's not all. Not even close," he told her. "When I was heading to Dumbledore's office, I ran into Trelawney being very literally kicked out of the Room of Requirement by someone who sounded to be celebrating in there. Wanna know who I think it was?"

Ginny sighed. "Malfoy."

"Malfoy," he confirmed, nodding. "Whatever he's spent doing all that time in the Room of Requirement, I'm pretty sure he succeeded at it… So you see what this means?"

"Dumbledore is not going to be here tonight," Ginny said, understanding.

"Malfoy's going to have another clear shot at whatever he's up to and I don't even want to start to imagine what it might be. The school will be unprotected."

Ginny shook her head immediately. "No, it won't. You may not be here but we are, Harry. Me, Izzy, Ron and Hermione… at least a few members from the DA too. We can keep an eye on him," she said confidently. "That slimy ferret will have plenty to worry about with us on him."

In any other occasion, Harry might have smiled from all the pride he felt for his girlfriend at that moment but, between the worry thickening the air around him and the feeling of ants crawling over his skin for being so close to destroying another Horcrux, a nod had to do the job. Suddenly, something occurred to him and Harry reached down for the trunk again, getting a hold of the folded piece of parchment that contained the Marauders Map and one of his socks before handing the former to Ginny. "That's the map. You'll probably need it more than me now. And one of you should also watch Snape." Harry chose not to tell her now what he'd found out about his so detested teacher at the moment – that he'd been the one to tell Voldemort of the prophecy. There was just no time and as much as he wanted to let that weight out of his chest, it would have to wait for later. "I don't trust him one bit. Dumbledore says he's put extra protection in the school, but if Snape's involved, he'll know what Dumbledore's protection is, and how to avoid it. He won't expect someone to be on the watch, though, will he?"

"Harry, stop worrying and leave that for us to handle," she told him. "You need to calm down before going with Dumbledore. Going after a Horcrux with your head full of worries about what may or may not be happening here in the school won't do you any good."

He sighed, looking at her. "You're right but… I just feel like this is all a setup for things to end up going on in a very bad way…" He shook his head to himself and looked down at the sock he'd fetched from inside his trunk before starting to tug at it until a little glass vial with golden liquid inside fell from it into his hand. "There, take this as well," he said, thrusting the vial into her hand.

"What is this for?" she asked, confused

"It's the Felix Felicis. There isn't enough of it for everyone, so one or two of you should take it and use it to steal more from Slughorn's stash. Share it with the people from our side as much as you can. It should keep you protected. I'd give you the invisibility cloak but I told Dumbledore I was…"

"No," Ginny said, before he could finish saying that as she thrusts the vial of potion back in his hands. "I don't want it. You take it. Who knows what you're going to be facing?"

"I'll be with Dumbledore, Ginny," he told her, trying to hand it back to her only to be refused. "Gin, please…"

"No. You said it yourself – I can steal some more from Slughorn."

"He always keeps his potion cupboard very well-locked. If you want to break into it, the Felix is your only chance, Ginny," he said, exasperated.

She pursed her lips. "Well, I'm not letting you out of here before you take at least one gulp of that potion. It's bad enough I have to stay back and let you go with Dumbledore to Merlin-knows-where do something Merlin-knows-how-dangerous! So take a swallow of it now before I pin you to your bed in a very unpleasant way and shove the whole vial, glass and everything, down your throat, Harry James Potter. Drink the bloody potion!"

Just as she placed her hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at him, Harry seriously wondered if his girlfriend was channelling her mother at the moment. Nevertheless the reason why he did take a sip of the potion a few seconds later wasn't because she intimidated him or anything (though if he was honest, he'd admit his girlfriend could be bloody scary when she wanted to), it was because he saw she needed him to do it, to know he was as safe as he could be, in order to worry about keeping herself safe too. Still, the sip he took was so small he doubted its effects would last for more than twenty minutes – after all, he wanted them to have enough for at least get their hands on more Felix Felicis. She didn't seem to notice how little of the potion he'd drunk when he handed it back to her. "There. Happy?"

She nodded. "Happy enough." And then, taking a sigh, Ginny took a couple of steps further, close enough to wrap her arms around his neck and pull him down slightly until their lips met in a kiss. It was exactly what both of them needed and Harry silently praised his girlfriend for so often knowing exactly what he needed. When they broke apart, she gave him a warning look. "No funny stuff, Potter. This was good-luck kiss, not a goodbye one."

He nodded. "I figured," he mumbled, just as a knock sounded on the door and it opened without waiting for an answer.

Izzy stood in the doorway, one eyebrow rising. "It's always snogging with you too, isn't it?" she asked in a dry tone. "Here I thought you'd fetched Ginny for something actually important in some we're-in-trouble sort of way."

"I did, actually," Harry replied, his tone free of humour as he pulled away from his girlfriend.

"What's wrong?" she asked, suddenly tense.

"No time to explain. Ginny will do it for me. I'd better go, Dumbledore's waiting," he told her, giving Ginny's hand a final tug before letting go of it and grabbing his invisibility cloak. On his way out, he stopped for a moment and reached for his pocket, removing the two-way mirror Sirius had given him and handed it to Izzy. "If things get sticky, call your dad and have him bring in the Order." Then, he sighed and gave a quick hug to the girl he saw as a sister ever since she'd been born. "Try not to do anything too stupid, Iz. I'm supposed to be looking after you." And then he was gone.

Izzy raised her eyebrows as she turned to Ginny. "Alright, what the hell is going on?"

Ginny sighed and sank down to a sitting position on Harry's bed. "Trouble, that's what's going on."

**A/N: To be continued...**

**And so the end of sixth year madness starts. I hope you liked the chapter - it was a struggle writing it because I had so little time this week... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	24. Felix

**A/N: Sorry for the delay guys but I've got a surprise this week: a two-part chapter! And no, I didn't split it up this time - two different POVs, one chapter. And so I give you the biggest chapter I've ever posted in my life... 17 pages, 8k words worth.**

As soon as Sirius and Mia stepped foot on Diagon Alley, they were amazed by how much it had changed since the last time they'd been there, three or four weeks before. While one might have thought that it could only get worse with more shops getting closed, abandoned or vandalized and even less people walking around, it had actually gotten better.

It seemed the absence of Death Eater attacks in the past few months had brought a little bit of its life back to the Wizarding area of London: there were people – several hundreds of them – walking around window-shopping or simply strolling and a few shops and pubs that had been closed seemed to be open again and ready to receive the celebrations that would take place after that night's Quidditch League finals. Some pubs were already full of noisy Quidditch supporters, ready to hear the wireless commentary of the game in groups.

Witnessing those dynamics suddenly made Sirius thoughtful. It was bittersweet watching life return to Diagon Alley: in a way, it showed people weren't letting themselves be crushed by the war and giving up on their little indulgences such as watching the most important Quidditch game of the year in a pub with their friends; in another way, it felt just like the calm before a storm had come by to turn everything back to shambles – and that storm had a very well-known name: Lord Voldemort. He liked to play that game more than anyone: letting people think that maybe everything was going to be okay for a while, allow themselves to put their guard down… and then one day out of nowhere show back up and break the illusion like it was made out of a thin layer of glass. And the worst part was that so many people fell into that scheme over and over again.

Of one thing Sirius Black was sure: he wouldn't believe everything was okay and let his guard down until his godson had sent the snake-faced bastard back to the place where he belonged, which was nowhere other than hell.

"You look awfully serious," Mia observed, bringing him back from his thought as they walked along the pavement of Diagon Alley together. "Don't tell me you're still crabby about having given up your lazy afternoon."

He shook his head. "Nope, it's none of that. I was just thoughtful – I didn't expect to find this place so… alive. At least not until the Harpies won the game and came here to celebrate."

Mia looked sideways and raised an eyebrow at her husband. "How can you possibly know the Harpies are going to win? Not that I really care about who wins but I was under the impression that Quidditch game hadn't started yet."

"Honey, first rule for Quidditch's common sense: with Gwenog Jones on the lead, the Harpies _always_ win," Sirius told her like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "It's as inevitable as Snape's hair having enough grease in it for him to sell by the pound."

His wife gave him a doubtful look. "Oh, I was under the impression the first rule for Quidditch was 'watch out for the bludgers'. You know, you the whole risk of ending up with a cracked skull or, worse, a missing head…"

"No, love, that's the first rule for Quidditch _safety_, not the first rule for Quiddich's _Common sense_. It's completely different," he said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Mia gave her husband a sceptical look as they walked. "Completely different how? That just doesn't make any sense…" She huffed and shook her head. "Oh, never mind. I'm perfectly happy with not understanding Quidditch at all."

Sirius sighed dramatically. "Well, that's just sad. Of all the women I could have fallen for, the one that I ended up marrying had to be completely clueless when it comes to my favourite sport."

Once again, she raised her eyebrows at him. "Is that a complaint, Mr. Black?" she asked, forcing an all-too-sweet tone into her voice. "Because do you know who is a really good listener for complaints? The living room couch, which is where you'll be sleeping tonight and possibly for the next two to three nights if you keep it up." She was bluffing, of course, but hopefully he's swallow the threat and be done with it…

"No complaining here," he assured her immediately, reaching closer to her to place a kiss on her cheek as a way of asking her for a truce. "I happen to be very fond of your other qualities, not to mention pitifully in love with you. It's almost embarrassing, really."

She smiled. "Slick as a weasel, aren't you, Sirius? That was a good save."

He grinned in return, wrapping one arm around her waist as they walked – it occurred to him that coming to Diagon Alley that day might have not been such a bad idea after all. He didn't reckon he might have the chance to so shamelessly flirt with his wife at home with the kids to worry about. "You know I am. And by the way, it had been a while since you'd last threatened me with a night on the sofa."

"Clearly too long," she agreed.

"Can't say I agree. Though I should probably remind you that our house has about half a dozen unoccupied rooms with perfectly comfortable beds that would spare me from sleeping on the living room couch."

She gave him a defying look in return. "I should probably remind you that we have a house-elf that is not your biggest fan and would jump at the opportunity of keeping you locked out of those half a dozen unoccupied rooms with perfectly comfortable beds so you'd really have to sleep on the living room couch."

Sirius narrowed his eyes at his wife. "You're a devious little thing, aren't you, willing to set Kreacher on me like a wild dog?"

She looked quite proud. "Well, I had to inherit something from Lulu's genes, hadn't I? Oh, look, there's Elizabeth," Mia said just as she spotted her friend at a distance, walking out of a shop called '_Wiseacre's Wizarding Equipmen_t', followed by her children. She tried to wave at her but Elizabeth didn't seem to react at all.

"I don't think she's seen you, love," Sirius pointed out, noting that the blonde seemed to be busy enough paying attention to what her daughter, Evie, was saying at the same time she got a hold of her son's arm before he had a chance to sneak his way into the Quidditch supplies shop, so amazed he seemed to be with the broomsticks exposed behind its windows. "Wonder if it will be like that with our kids in a few years."

Mia snorted. "Knowing their father, I'd say keeping them under control will be even more challenging. And you still insist you want a couple more…"

"Sirius Black doesn't back-out on any challenge," he happily informed his wife, who sighed and shook her head in disbelief.

"Come on," she said, urging him to follow her as she approached their friend, moving through the groups of people walking along the path.

"…Mummy? Please? Can we go get my wand now?" Evie Bagman seemed to be begging her mother when Sirius and Mia reached them. "It's almost time for me to go to Hogwarts!"

Elizabeth huffed. "Evie, you won't be starting there until September. That's almost _three_ months from now and you know you're not allowed by the ministry to use a wand outside of Hogwarts before you turn seventeen," she told her daughter, exasperated at her excitement and very aware that with Ollivander's trashed, there was no other wand-maker in Wizarding London.

"Aw Mummy…"

"The ministry really knows how to take the fun out of things, don't they?" Sirius asked the young girl, who turned to face him immediately, recognizing her mother's friends. "Look at the bright side – at least you can still use a broom."

The young girl smiled. "Daddy took me flying when we visited him last month."

"And me! And me!" her younger brother, six-year-old Harper Bagman, insisted, unwilling to be left out of the conversation.

"Yeah, Harper went too," she declared. "He let us ride on his camel and took us flying afterwards. Then, he said I might make it to my house's team in a few years."

_Camel_? Sirius thought to himself – it was no secret Ludo Bagman was overseas still on the run from the goblins for owing them money. Was the bloke now covering as a Bedouin somewhere in Arabia or something? _Never mind_, he told himself. "Well, we'll see how good a flyer you are next September since I'll be the one giving you flying lessons," Sirius told her. "Mia here will be teaching you too. I bet if you ask her nicely she'll tell you all about Hogwarts later."

Evie smiled at the prospect and Elizabeth gave Sirius a thankful smile, glad he'd distracted her daughter from her near-tantrum.

As Elizabeth and Mia started chatting, Sirius took a moment to observe his surroundings, searching for Auror presences among the people. He spotted a few serious yet nervous-looking young men standing by the entrance of Gringotts that were easy to identify as fresh-out-of-training aurors. Soon, he also saw more experienced ones such as the always unlucky Dawlish and other two who he recalled being named Savage and Williamson and had gotten into the Auror training one year after James had. They all seemed to be ready for any trouble and Sirius deemed it safe for him to leave. "Well, ladies," he said, before lowering his gaze to Harper, "and gentleman, it appears I have to go."

Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. "You're not sticking around?"

"Not until dinner time," he told her. "There's no way I'm letting you all use me as your personal shopping cart, Harper. I meant your Mom," he added, seeing the youngest Bagman's confused face at the use of his name. "So," he said, reaching to place a kiss on wife's cheek, "if you need me I'll be the one annoying the life out of Remus in his own workplace. Shameful, isn't it?"

"Awfully shameful," Mia agreed.

"Tell him bring Tonks and join us for dinner too," Elizabeth said. "I don't think I've seen him since Mary was born. That was over five months ago."

Sirius nodded. "I'll be sure to bring them along, dragged if I have to." And then he walked away, leaving Mia and their old friend behind to do their catching up on their own.

When he arrived at the joke shop, seeing it clattered with people was definitely no news – Fred and George ought to be millionaires by the end of the year with the amount of clients they had… that was, if they weren't already. That day, Lee Jordan seemed to be in charge of the sales along with the pretty blonde girl the twins had hired, Varity, who, as soon as she saw Sirius, signalled to the door behind the counter, telling him he could go right upstairs. It was like he was already an honorary part of the staff, Sirius thought as he climbed up the stairs – it sure helped he was the godfather of the twin's main investor and silent partner, Harry.

As he stepped into Remus's office, Sirius was surprised to note that his friend was nowhere to be found. Instead, though, he was greeted by the sight of _someone_ lounging on his friend's sofa, seemingly busy reading a magazine. Someone whose pink hair – with bright red highlights that day, it seemed – was peaking from behind the magazine-barrier covering her face.

When she spoke, Tonks didn't take her eyes away from the magazine she'd been reading. "Hey, there's a Weird Sisters concert in Cardiff next month. I've been thinking that it's a shame that we've been together for practically a year and I _still_ haven't taken you to a concert of my favourite band – what do you say the two of us pack a bag, head to Cardiff for a little romantic weekend then and go see that concert since we're already there?"

Sirius barely managed to hold his laughter before responding. "Why, Tonks, dear, I'd just love to but I have a feeling our respective spouses would have one thing or two to say about us having a romantic weekend together…"

Tonks suddenly looked over the magazine, closed it before putting it aside, and raised her eyebrows at her cousin, who shot her a grin. "I thought you were Remus," she told him, stating the obvious. Then, her face became amused. "I hope you realize that offer doesn't apply to you."

He gave a dramatic sigh. "Aw, well, one can hope… Anyway, speaking of Remus, why isn't he sitting at that lovely desk elbow deep in paperwork or something?"

"He needed to go upstairs to the twins' flat to get their signature for something. Apparently they've been up there all day doing experiments and blowing up stuff," she declared. "There was black smoke coming out of their window when I arrived – Remus said it was normal."

"Sounds like they're having plenty of fun," Sirius replied in amusement, taking a seat on one of the chairs in front of his friend's desk, resting his feet on the other one. "So, Tonks, I was under the impression you worked on Saturdays too. You know, as a way to keep your mind occupied and away from the sorrow of being unable to spend the first day of the weekend with your beloved husband."

The metamorphagus chuckled. "Seems impossible to handle the heartbreak. I'll have you know I only work on _some_ Saturdays, though – always in Diagon Alley patrol duty, by the way. Today I'm not on full-duty but I'm supposed to be ready to step in if there's trouble with the Quidditch finals festivities and they need reinforcements here or at the stadium."

"What? It's been getting that bad lately?"

"You have no idea. Last year I had to drag a naked bloke to the auror department because he'd seen it fitting to thank the Harpies for winning the game by flashing them. Believe me, by the looks of him, if anything he was getting back at them for the other team. It gets mad out there."

"You don't need to say that twice," Sirius mumbled, shuddering at the thought. "Anyway, how did you manage to get assigned to Diagon Alley patrol _every _Saturday you work? Coincidently so close to where your better half works… What sort of twisted pact did you make with your boss to get such an arrangement? Sold him a kidney? A lung? Maybe your soul?"

She snorted. "What use would Kingsley have for a spare organ or a human soul? He's not much into creepy keepsakes the way some people – sadly some of them related to us – are…" The metamorphagus shivered and for a moment her hair showed a hue of green before turning back to the initial pink and red colour. "Maybe I have some dirt on him and am using it for blackmail."

"Yeah, right, you're too nice to blackmail anyone," her cousin told her without a doubt.

Tonks sighed. "Alright, I'm not using it for blackmail. Let's just say it's been months since Head Auror Kingsley Shacklebolt has filled at least half of the paperwork he should be filling, leaving that task for his favourite former trainee: me. I can actually fake his signature perfectly now."

"Ah, so Kingsley gets his paperwork filled and you get an arrangement that is just perfect for booty calls," Sirius concluded with a grin.

"Perfect for what?" The two of them turned to the source of the voice by the door and came face to face with a wide-eyed Remus staring at them in disbelief. "What on Earth are you two talking about?"

"Booty calls, mate," Sirius repeated, grinning. "Or, you know, Tonks here dropping by 'casually' leading you two to… you know." He shook his head. "Shame on you, mate. Right in the middle of a work day…"

"Says the bloke who happens to work in the same place as his wife," Tonks pointed out. "How many times have you dropped by her classroom for said purposes?"

Sirius casually grabbed a paper from his friend's desk and pretended to be paying it every bit of attention he had to spare. "A gentleman doesn't shag and tell, Nymphadora."

Tonks narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't call me Nymphadora!"

Her husband cleared his throat. "I think the main question here is this: since when have you been a 'gentleman', Sirius?" Remus asked in return, sitting at his desk.

"Oh, I resent that," Sirius said, faking offence. "A bloke comes by to pay a visit and all he gets is bashing and not even a greeting word. That's sad, mate."

Remus shook his head and chuckled. "Well, fancy seeing you here, Sirius. How can I help you?"

"See? That's better. Now, let's get to business, mate: it's seems you are in debt to me."

Remus raised his left eyebrow. "Am I? I don't recall borrowing money from you lately. Or ever, for that matter."

"Oh, not that sort of debt, Moony. I'm not talking about money – I'm talking about a godchild," Sirius informed him.

Remus's right eyebrow joined its left neighbour, slightly above its usual level. "A godchild?"

"A godchild," Sirius confirmed. "See mate, since I've already given you two of those, Alex and Mary, it's only fair you give me at least one godchild. No, not just any godchild – a goddaughter. With Harry, that would give me one of each. I enjoy variety."

"You want a goddaughter?"

"That's right, Moony. Now, if you have a boy first, I won't mind another godson too… as long as you eventually get me a goddaughter to add to the team." He grinned and turned to Tonks, who seemed to be amused enough watching the show. "Back me up here, Tonks."

"Oh, I think I'll sit this one out. It's funnier watching it from out here. But go on, really," she urged them.

Sirius mumbled something that sounded a lot like 'traitor' under his breath before turning back to his friend. "Well, when am I getting my godkid, then?"

"I am not even going to consider answering that question," Remus told him dryly.

"Say all you want, mate, but I won't rest until I get it. I managed to get you married, didn't I?"

"Shut up, Padfoot."

"Just warning you, Moony," Sirius told him casually, leaning back against his chair

On his own chair, Remus let out a deep breath and shook his head, telling himself his friend was mad for even considering the thought of him being a father. "So, why is Mia not here to keep your madness under control?"

"Oh, she's busy outside catching up with Elizabeth and her kids," Sirius told him, going along with the break from the goddaughter matter. "We're supposed to be having dinner later at the Leaky Cauldron, though my money is on us switching to somewhere else in Muggle London because it will be too cluttered with people wanting to celebrate the game by then. Oh, and by the way, you two are coming too."

Remus sighed. "Are we?"

"I promised Harper I'd drag you if I had to, Moony, so yeah, you are coming either you want it or not," Sirius informed him matter-of-factly before turning to Tonks. "I expect I won't have to drag you too, do I?"

"Are you kidding? I'm all for going out with you guys," she replied just as the sound of a loud explosion came from the flat upstairs, making all three look up as dust fell from the ceiling.

"I'm assuming that is normal," Sirius mumbled

Remus huffed and headed to the door. "Boys?" he yelled to the corridor.

"_We're still in one piece!_" one of them yelled back from upstairs, proving no major harm had been caused

The sound of footsteps coming down the stairs filled their ears, then, and the two redheads came into the room, their faces darkened by what seemed to be ash covering them everywhere except from around their eyes, likely die to them wearing protective glasses.

"No need to go running to Mom telling her we blew ourselves up. I think we're done experimenting today, anyway," one of the twins said as he brushed the ash away from the battered Muggle jeans he was wearing before noticing Sirius's and Tonks's presences. "Oh, hey guys!"

"Hey. Seems like you've been busy upstairs," Sirius told them. "What are you up to?"

"Classified order from the auror department," the other replied, winking conspiringly at Tonks. "For all intents and purposes, we are trying to find a formula that will make Pigmy Puffs glow in the dark."

"Fred, George, listen," Remus requested. "If you show up for Sunday dinner with another scar, your mother will have my hide for not keeping an eye on you. I don't need to remind you how loud she yelled when you got that scar over your eyebrow, Fred."

"She shouldn't be complaining," Fred said, rubbing his eyebrow absently – Sirius did notice a half-inch long scar marring the skin over the redhead's right eyebrow. "Now it takes her just one look to tell us apart. Besides, Angie says it's sexy. Girls love a bloke with battle scars, don't they?" he asked Tonks.

"Most definitely," she assured them, smiling back and winking at her husband, who looked away in embarrassment.

Sirius snorted at his friend's reaction. "Oh, isn't he just adorab…"He paused, feeling something warming up in his pocket, which he immediately reached for – it was the two-way mirror. "Hold that thought – I've got to take this. It's probably Harry saying Snape got him in trouble again," he mumbled, still half-grinning while tapping his wand on the mirror to activate it. To his surprise, it wasn't Harry's face on the mirror but Izzy's – and she looked far from calm.

"Iz?" he asked her, feeling himself goingtense. He knew it was something bad.

"_Death Eaters have just infiltrated in the school, Daddy. You've got to send the Order now_!" she said

And just like that Sirius was proven right: all the life bursting in Diagon Alley had been nothing more than the calm before the storm. A storm that was about to spill its rage.

* * *

**H****ogwarts – One hour earlier**

"This isn't enough for all six of us to take a dose that will last long," Hermione said, observing the little vial of Felix Felicis as she held it in her hand before placing it down on the library table in front of her.

It hadn't been more than five minutes since Ginny and Izzy had burst into the library – sending the stiff-necked librarian, Madam Pince, in a rampage over it – looking for her and Ron s, followed by Neville and Luna who they'd found on their way there and found fitting to bring along, looks of alarm all over their face. After casting several imperturbable and repelling charms around themselves to evade being interrupted or eavesdropped, the news Izzy and Ginny brought along were even more unsettling than their facial expressions: Harry had just left to chase a Horcrux along with the headmaster and now, with the school left without Dumbledore's physical protection, they had reasons to believe that whatever Malfoy had been planning all year would take place that evening. Of one thing they were sure: given the events of that year, it couldn't be good, whatever it was.

"So Harry was right. We have to steal some more potions," Ginny concluded as they all sat around the library table.

"That's easier said than done," Hermione stated. "If there's anything Slughorn is careful about, it's about not leaving potions laying around for students to grab when they fancy." She sighed. "Do you really think we'll all need the Felix Felicis?"

"Are you willing to risk finding out?" Ron asked in return. "Maybe I'm only speaking for myself but if I know I have the chance to get really lucky when trouble is coming, I take it without a doubt."

"How… how do we do it then?" Neville inquired.

"Well, maybe we could all split the Felix in that little vial among ourselves now. It wouldn't last long but we could always drink a bigger dose we get Slughorn's," Izzy suggested

Hermione shook her head immediately. "No! No way."

"Why not?" Ron asked in confusion. "It would be perfect."

"No, it wouldn't! Didn't you read what it said in your book about the potion?" she asked the redhead, indignated.

"Only that it would make you lucky. Not all us read a textbooks as if it were a novel,."

"Guys, quit picking on each other and get to the point," Ginny reminded them, exasperated. "For all we know, we don't have time for this."

Hermione nodded. "Drinking multiple doses of Felix Felicis within a three day long interval of time severely brings up the risk of the potion's effects being inverted. It means…"

"If we take Felix Felicis more than once in a three-day period, it can make us very unlucky instead of very lucky," Luna finished for her in her usual dreamy voice. "It does make sense. Recent studies Daddy has ordered proved the same happens with the Drought to Repel Magical Creatures – we were thinking of using it next year to attract Crumple-Horned…"

Izzy cleared her throat, trying to stop her friend's ramble. "I don't think we can risk getting unlucky under the circumstances."

"So, what do we do, then? For how many people is there enough potion?" Neville asked.

Hermione grabbed the vial and studied for a long moment. "I'd say there's about thirty millilitres in here. It should be enough for two people at the most, lasting for about three to four hours after they take it. Maybe a little longer if Slughorn brew it with freshly-caught ingredients," Hermione told them. "They're said to enhance the potion's effectivity."

There was a moment of silence then, when they all thought the same. Ginny was the first of them to speak it out loud. "So… who'll take it?"

"Well," Hermione started, "Harry gave the vial to you, Ginny… he'd want you to take it."

"What? Beacause I'm his girlfriend? Don't even think of it. Izzy is his sister, you and Ron are like his family too, Neville and Luna are his friends… I'm not taking it over that logic, Hermione."

"Alright, alright," the older girl said. "But if you don't take it over that logic, at least take it over this one: whoever goes into Slughorn's classroom to steal more potion should already have a dose of this one to make sure the odds of getting caught are smaller. It's been clear from the beginning that you want to be there to do it. So, you should take the potion."

Nobody countered Hermione's logic and not even Ginny was able to do it. "Fine. I'll take it, then," she gave in. "But we still have to decide who else takes it."

Luna cleared her throat. "I think Hermione should be the one to do it," she told them softly.

"Me? Why me?" the brunette asked in surprise.

"Because you're the smartest person we know," Luna told her. "A bit sceptic when it comes to Naturalism but still smart."

"I may be smart but I'm certainly not sneaky enough!"

Ron shook his head. "Not sneaky wnough? You were the brains behind the DA. Practically ran half of it with Harry last year! And don't make me mention how many times you saved the day for me and Harry."

Izzy nodded in agreement. "Your brains and the Felix Felicis are exactly what we need. And if you're still not convinced you're sneaky, Ginny can be sneaky for both of you."

"Looks like, you're outnumbered," Neville told her.

Before she had the chance to bring up another argument, Ginny was already handing her the open vial of Felix Felicis. "You first," she declared.

"But…" she faintly tried to argue.

"Hermione, we don't have the time to discuss this further," the redhead told her.

Hermione sighed in defeat and accepted the bottle. She drank the liquid almost as if she was measuring and when she stopped, there didn't seem to be a bit more or a bit less than half the initial quantity. After the older girl was done, Ginny drank her share and waited to feel some sort of effect.

"Well?" Ron asked.

"Nothing," she mumbled.

"Nothing? It's not working?"

"No, it's working," Hermione said. "I think someone should go keep a watch on the Room of Requirement to see if something happens in there. I think something _will_ happen."

"You think?" Ron asked sceptically.

"It's a feeling," she said.

"I can go there, then," Luna offered.

"Me two. Leave the Room of Requirement to Luna and I."

One less thing for them to worry about, Ginny thought. _Snape,_ a voice sounded in her head. "And Snape. We can't forget him. Harry seemed to be convinced he was in on this…"

"I can watch him," Izzy offered.

"No," Ginny told her. "You're coming with Hermione and me."

"Why?"

The redhead shrugged. "I dunno. I just have a feeling we'll need you nearby," she said, turning to her brother. "Ron, you can keep a watch on Snape, can't you?"

"Sure. Harry left you the Marauders Map, didn't he?" he asked in return. "'Cause I have no idea where he may be right now."

Ginny nodded and reached for her pocket, removing the Marauders Map and spreading it over the table's top. After mumbling the words to reveal the drawings in it, all six of them quickly started searching for the former Potions Master, who was found by Hermione in the teachers' lounge a few seconds later.

"Oh, crap," Izzy said suddenly, pointing at a specific dot on the map's surface. "Slughorn is in his classroom. How can we do this with him in his classroom? We're doomed."

"No, we're not. We'll have to get the potion while he's in there," Hermione told them in tone that sounded way too clam to have come out of her mouth at all.

"Are you insane, Hermione?" Neville asked.

"No, I have an idea, actually. Keep the map, will you?" she said, smiling as she got up and reached for her wand in order to remove the charms surrounding them that had been keeping eavesdroppers away. "Izzy, Ginny, let's go."

* * *

Isabelle Black wasn't sure how to describe the effects that the Felix Felicis was causing on her friends. All she knew was that they most definitely freaked her out – it was like they knew how things would turn out before even doing them! She damn well hoped their 'feelings' were leading to something or they might very well end up expelled… Hogwarts didn't look kindly on students who were caught stealing potions from teachers.

When they reached Slughorn't classroom, initially Izzy had thought Hermione would somehow find a way to use a spell that would make the teacher oblivious to them at all as they sneaked into his stash but as soon as she'd seen the older girl advance to the door of the teacher's classroom and bluntly knock while telling her and Ginny to hide, she knew she was wrong.

"What is she doing?" she asked Ginny as they hid behind the same statue.

Ginny shrugged, not seeming bothered at all by the lack of information. "I don't know."

"Then how do you know what you're supposed to do?"

She shrugged again. "I'll just know."

A couple of yards away, Slughorn opened the door to Hermione, pleasantly greeting her. "_To what do I owe the honour of your visit, Miss Granger?_"

"_Professor, I believe I have come upon a revolutionizing discovery about the Elixir to Induce Euphoria. I was hoping I could share it with you, Professor, so you could give me some advice_," Hermione lied confidently, to Izzy's surprise. Did Felix Felicis go that far in terms of confidence or was she just possessed?

"_Why, of course, Miss Granger_," he said, moving out of the way and letting her in. When the older teacher moved away from the door it was surprisingly left fully open.

"Just look at our luck," Ginny said, grinning, walking from behind the statue in order to move closer to the door.

Izzy followed her there and saw that, inside the teacher's classroom, Hermione was suggesting she brewed the Elixir in front of him for the older man to note the changes, which the he accepted, seemingly curious about Hermione's 'discoveries. Where she was going with that, Izzy had no idea at all…

And then, Hermione started explaining her 'discovery': how stirring the potion counter-clockwise after every seven turns clockwise would reduce the four hours the potion had to spend stewing to simply two, how reducing the dose of castor beans by one would soften the taste. "_And if you add a sprig of peppermint to it, it will counter the excessive singing and nose-tweaking side-effects!_"

Listening to every word, both of their jaws dropped and they stared at each other – Hermione was quoting the prince's notes! She, the person who'd so widely criticized the book, was actually using it to do whatever she was planning! The irony of it!

They still weren't sure how Hermione's story would get them into the still- locked stash until she suddenly declared in a very sorrowful tone she'd completely forgotten her ingredients in her dorm. "_If you give me a moment, I'll just run to get them."_

"_Oh, nonsense, my girl. You can borrow some of mine, for the sake of progress_," Slughorn told her happily. "_Let me just get my ingredient suitcase…_" And then, he headed straight to his the closet where stash was located to fetch the suitcase. That was it!

This time, they weren't even surprised when the older man forgot to close the door of closet, leaving it half-open as he brought the large compartmented suitcase on top of the working table Hermione was using. It was the Felix Felicis in its best. And as Hermione started to get the ingredients ready to start brewing the potion, the Professor settled himself by her side, his back conveniently turned to their direction. Pretending to be fetching a piece of parchment from her bag, Hermione turned back and gave Izzy and Ginny a signal, silently telling them start putting the plan into practice.

"Come on," Ginny whispered.

"Me too?" Izzy asked in disbelief. "But I didn't take the Felix!"

"I know," her friend told her. "But I think you'll be needed in there. Trust me."

Izzy didn't really have another choice… Ginny was the first to walk in, taking each step very softly to make sure she wouldn't be heard. Her friend made an effort to do the same just as she followed her and the two managed to slip right through the half-open door without making a single bit noise.

The stash was enormous. There were at least four lines of shelves on each wall and each shelf full of aligned queues of potions. They had no idea where to start. And that wasn't the worst. As they browsed the vials of various sizes filled with potions, they realized something alarming: they were not labelled with the names of the potions. Instead, there were codes, all starting with a letter and followed by six numbers. J091354, M121910, A030910… The codes might be organized by order of letter and number but they still had no idea what they meant. It seemed pretty clear Slughorn did that to avoid having his potions stolen and consumed as they intended to do

"Ginny…" Izzy mumbled.

"I know," the redhead said – this time, she had no idea what to do. The Felix was supposed to give her luck. That wasn't luck, that was doom. Had she made a mistake by bringing along someone who hadn't taken the potion too?

Suddenly, her eyes landed on a pile of parchment. "Maybe there's a list of the codes and their names," she suggested in a whisper, approaching it. But there was still no sign of the Felix Felicis's doing and no mentions to the codes in any of the pieces of parchment in the pile. They really were so doomed…

It was in the midst of the desperation that Izzy noticed something. Another piece of parchment was hanging from under a flask on the edge of one of the shelves, right by a quill and ink. The ink on the flask's label was still fresh and she concluded Hermione had interrupted the teacher in the midst of labelling some potion. She carefully lifted the flask and pulled the piece of parchment from under it. It was the copy of a book's page, which she quickly browsed through.

One particular sentence caught her attention. "_The Dreamless Sleep potion was invented by Charles Hawthorne in June 1645…_" The letter H from Hawthorn was underlined and the numbers 0 and 6 were written over the word June. And, Izzy noted, the vial of potion was labelled H061645. She smiled triumphantly to herself. "I got it. The letter is the surname of the creator, the numbers are the date. Hawthorne June 1645." She turned to Ginny, who was still rummaging through the shelves. "Do you have any idea who invented Felix Felicis and when?"

"No," Ginny replied, turning around and showing her the copy of Advanced Potion-Making – that one Harry had switched for the Prince's – she had just found. "But I bet this does." If it wasn't for the Felix, she might have been surprised that the first page she opened was the one concerning the potion in question. "Let me see…_ Felix Felicis, a highly awarded miraculous potion, that is documented to have been first brewed by the Italian Lord Paolo Felix Duomo in Rimini in the first day of November 1755_. That would make it… D111755."

"D111755… D111755…" Izzy mumbled to herself to make sure she wouldn't forget the code as she started looking through the shelves.

She located D soon enough and a few seconds later the slightly golden liquid inside a bottle labelled D111755 right at the very end of the shelf. There was at least a pint of it, certainly enough to give to a few people, though not all of them. She reached across the shelf with her hand to reach the bottle but as she started pulling it out, her elbow accidentally knocked over one of the bottles near the edge – for a fraction of a second, she could swear her heart stopped and she cursed herself for not leaving the job of getting the bottle to Ginny, to whom nothing could possibly go wrong.

But before the glass hit the floor, Ginny reached for her wand and pointed it at the bottle, whispering the word _Silencio_, causing it to break without a single sound. She and Ginny looked at each other, then, half disbelieving that had actually worked, and breathed in relief.

"That was a close one," Izzy whispered as her friend repaired the broken bottle with her wand, returning it to its shelf before she banished the liquid from the floor – Slughorn would have to live without it…

"I have a feeling we should get out of here right now," Ginny told her.

Izzy nodded and handed her the vial of potion, fearing she might break it too. The two peaked through the opening of the door and saw Slughorn was still entertained with seeing Hermione brewing the potion. The older girl spotted them and gave them an inquisitive look, which Ginny replied to by showing her the bottle. She gave a nod and turned her attention back to the potion.

So, very carefully, Ginny and then Izzy made their way back through the opening of the door and walked towards the door without making a single sound. As soon as they saw themselves out of the classroom and in the empty corridor instead, there was relief.

"It worked," Izzy mumbled, staring at the vial in Ginny's hands. "I can't believe it worked!"

"Well, drink the potion, then," Ginny urged her, shoving the bottle into her hand.

"Let's hope there's wasn't another bloke with a last name starting in D creating a potion in November 1755," she mumbled before uncovering the bottle and bringing it to her lips and drinking one single gulp of it.

Hermione was just leaving the classroom by the time Izzy was closing the bottle back. "Let me see it," she requested immediately, reaching for the bottle with her hand. She frowned. "D111755?"

"Long story," Ginny told her. "We're pretty sure it's the Felix, though. Izzy has already taken it and everything. How did you escape Slughorn so fast?"

"Oh… I… I obliviated him," she admitted guiltily, to her friends' shock. "I know, it's awful but something told me we'd still get in trouble if I didn't… I only deleted a few minutes from his mind, I think. When I left, he thought I had just come by to say hello…"

"Using the Half-Blood Prince's notes, lying like a pro, obliviating a teacher… _who_ are you?" Ginny asked her.

Hermione sighed, looking down. "I do feel awful about it…"

"Let's just move on, guys, there's no time to feel guilty now," Izzy said. "We should go give the potion to the others." _No, just Ron for now,_ a little voice – that Felix Felicis feeling – told her. _Going to Neville and Luna right now is not a good idea_. She couldn't do that, though. Neville and Luna were her friends. What could she do? "Ginny, do you still have Harry's vial with you?"

The redhead nodded, removing it from her pocket. "It's empty, though…"

"It's perfect," she countered, reaching for her wand and pointing it to the little vial and muttering the engorging charm, making it several times bigger that it had been just seconds before. "Can you open them?" She asked Ginny, nodding at both containers.

"You're going to split the potion?" her friend asked as she complied.

Izzy nodded. "Yeah," she said, pouring about half the liquid into the now bigger vial before handing it to Ginny so she could close it back. "You and Hermione… you guys should take that one and go find Ron. Share it with whoever you see fitting," she told them. "I'll go to Neville and Luna instead."

"Izzy, that's…" Hermione started, looking apprehensive.

"I know, I felt it too," Izzy said – she knew she was risking her luck by not listening to the Felix. "But they're still our friends. I've got to go to them anyway, especially if they may be in trouble."

Hermione sighed and nodded understandingly just as Ginny handed her the vial of potion.

"I'm going with you," the redhead told Izzy. "If they're in trouble I want to help too."

"Ginny…"

The redhead looked determined. "And that's final."

That left no room for arguments. Hermione sighed once more. "Be careful, alright?" she advised them.

"We will," Izzy replied, right before the other brunette turned around and headed to the nearest flight of stairs.

Seconds later, Izzy and Ginny left too, taking a secret passage that they knew would lead straight to the seventh floor, only a few corridors away from the Room of Requirement. The secret passage consisted of a very long ladder inside what seemed to be one of the castle's tunnel-like air conducts, which made it very cramped and uncomfortable to climb up. A few minutes later, they saw themselves coming out of a hole on the floor inside a little compartment hidden behind a tapestry and knew they had reached the upmost floor of the castle.

"Were people that much thinner a millennium ago when they build this castle? 'Cause there barely was space for us to breathe in there," Ginny mumbled, coming out from behind the tapestry as Izzy checked on the bottle of Felix Felicis, making sure it hadn't been smashed on the way up.

"Look at the bright side at least Crabbe and Goyle will never be able to use this passage," Izzy mumbled, following her friend as they started to head to where they believed their friends were.

They found Neville and Luna a couple of minutes later and were surprised to discover Dean Thomas, Seamus Finnigan and Terry Boot with them, all five of them hiding behind a statue located on the opposite side of the corridor that led to the always-changing room.

"Hope you don't mind," Neville told them when he saw them. "But they wanted to help."

"Are you kidding? The more, the better," Ginny told him, glad to see at least some members of the DA were still active, after all. "Have you guys seen anything yet?"

He shook his head. "Nobody has been in or out since we've been here." He reached for his pocket, handing her back the blank parchment that was the Marauders Map. "Ron said that if we can't find Malfoy in there, it means he's still in there. We've already checked a dozen times…"

Ginny nodded. "He'll come out – can't stay in there forever, can he?" she told him just as Izzy was handing the Felix to Luna.

"One gulp each," Izzy instructed. "That's all we can afford right now."

"What's that?" Seamus asked her sceptically, looking at the liquid.

She gave him a small smile. "Liquid luck."

"No kidding…" Terry Boot mumbled in wonder. "Where did you get that from? Did you brew it yourselves?"

"No, we didn't," Ginny told him. "And where we got it is just for us to know, Terry. Sorry to desap…"

She wasn't able to finish what she was saying though, as Neville elbowed her, pointing to the large doors that had appeared at the end of the hallway. Someone was coming out now of the room of requirement. But before they had the chance to see what Malfoy was up to, the boy with platinum blonde hair threw a handful of some sort of dark powder to the air, making the whole room become completely black.

"_Oh my_…" Izzy heard Luna mumble in the midst of the darkness surrounding them.

Dean was the next to speak. "_What the_…"

"_Shh!_" Ginny's voice demanded. "_It has to be Peruvian Darkness Powder. My brothers sell it in their shop. Now be quiet!_"

They did as she said and several seconds of complete silence followed, during which they could practically hear their own heartbeats. Footsteps started to sound then. Many of them. And suddenly, they heard a voice speaking somewhere nearby – not more than twienty feet away. A familiar, chilling voice. "_Well done, Draco, well done. I knew you wouldn't disappoint the Dark Lord_," it said in an almost silky tone with s hint of instability in it.

"_Be quiet, Bella!_" an unfamiliar voice said sternly.

Each and every one of them felt cold at that moment. Bellatrix Lestrange was there… at Hogwarts. Somehow, Malfoy had let her in. And Merlin knew she'd brought her friends along. Hogwarts had been infiltrated by Death Eaters – maybe even Voldemort himself and right now, none of them could react because of the thick darkness that was surrounding them. The footsteps kept sounding and sounding, becoming more and more distant by the second. By the time the darkness started to dissipate, seconds later, no Death Eater was present. Who knew where they might be hiding…

"That was…" Neville started, his voice shaking at hearing the voice of his parents' attacker.

"We know," Ginny finished for him, placing a supportive hand on his shoulder.

"What do we do?" Dean Thomas asked.

"We summon the Order of the Phoenix," Izzy replied, already reaching for the two-way mirror that Harry had given her earlier, remembering what he had told her then. She called her father's name and waited. Seconds later, her face reflected in the mirror was replaced his half-smiling one – it took a fraction of a second for him to see something was wrong with her expression and to the smile to disappear.

"_Iz_?"

"Death Eaters have just infiltrated in the school, Daddy. You've got to send the Order now!"

**A/N: To be continued...**

**I hope you liked the chapter guys - don't get used to the size by the way. I just kept writing and writing and writing... it wouldn't let go of me! Thus the delay... So, I hope you enjoyed the extra-large chapter :D Only one more week of internship and then I have my deserved well-vacation... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	25. The Last Dive

Later, thinking back to his reaction to Izzy's alarmed statement, Sirius would wonder how so many feelings and thoughts had managed to compress their way through such a short period of time… the one that preceded his response. Had it been one second? Two? It couldn't have been more than two, he was sure. At first he thought he might have heard it wrong but the look on the reflection of his daughter's face on the mirror told him that wasn't true. The next thought was that he might have imagined that, in a nightmare, maybe: soon enough he would wake up with Mia's soft form by his side and shake his head at how silly the idea of Death Eaters infiltrating Hogwarts – Hogwarts of all places! – was. That school's protection was known as nearly unbeatable, after all.

_Nearly_, he thought. It wouldn't be the first time a threat – himself having allegedly been one of those not many years before – slipped through Hogwarts' wards and threatened its students, namely Harry. Deep down he knew Izzy might very well be right. "Izzy," he started, feeling his throat as dry as if it had been covered with parchment, "are you s…?"

"_Yes, Daddy!_" she replied before we could finish. "_They came through the room of requirement somehow. We couldn't actually see them – they used Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder to make everything dark – but…_"

"Those bloody bastards used _our_ Instant Darkness Powder?" Sirius heard one of the twins ask in outrage behind him, just as Izzy continued. Had to feel like a punch right in the gut.

"… _we heard them talking_," his daughter said. "_Bellatrix was congratulating Malfoy for managing to get them in_!"

A chill ran down his spine as he thought of his cousin – that bloody bitch who'd very nearly killed his wife _and _his baby last time he'd come face to face with her – standing in the very same building as his daughter. And Harry, he added. As paralyzing as it felt for the first few seconds, that thought helped him snap back to reality – there was just no time to be fearful and he needed to do something about it! "Alright," he told his daughter, trying to even his voice, "is Harry there with you?"

She shook her head. "_He's not here in the school. He and Dumbledore… they had some business to solve outside._"

They'd gone after a Horcrux. "Crap," he cursed under his breath. Could it get any worse? The school was under attack and the headmaster was out with Harry doing a task that to this day Sirius still had no idea how dangerous might be… If there was anything positive out of it, it was that at least Harry wasn't at the mercy of the Death Eaters now. He took a deep breath and turned his attention back to the two-way mirror. "Find a teacher, then, tell him what you heard… no, tell him you saw – it will be easier to believe – and have the message passed to McGonagall. Then go to the Common Room and stay there. I don't want you in the middle of that mess."

On the mirror, Izzy frowned. "_I already am in the middle of it_," she retorted in a slightly edgy tone.

"Izzy…"

"_Just send the order, Daddy. Don't worry about me. I've got a feeling luck's on my side today_," she said just as her face vanished from the polished piece of glass.

"Damn it!" he immediately cursed out loud. It didn't take a genius to know his daughter was most definitely not going to stay in the common room as he'd commanded. The damn kid was too much like him – she'd go running straight into the fight, where she thought she could help. She'd better be right about luck being on her side.

They couldn't rely on luck, though. They needed to act fast. "Tonks…" he started, motioning to turn to the Auror in the room and noting she was already on her feet and ready for action – it was clear he hadn't been the only one hearing his daughter's words as all others were alarmed too.

"I'm on it," she replied before he could finish – if there was something she could never be accused of, was of not being quick on her feet even if from time to time that would cause her to trip on stuff. "I'll go and alert the Auror team stationed in Hogsmeade and call for reinforcements." Then, she turned to her husband and gave him a look that clearly warned him to be careful, to which he responded with another look bearing the same meaning right before the pink-haired metamorphagus grabbed her wand and apparated out of the room.

"I can contact a few members of the Order and have them spread the word," Remus offered as the echo of the cracking sound caused by his wife's disapparition still sounded in the room.

"Make that silent calling thing too if you know how," Sirius mumbled.

"I will," Remus told him in a sure tone. "You should go find Mia and Elizabeth now. They have healing training, so they might be needed. Also, I'm sure they'll want to know about this."

Sirius nodded. "That's what I was just going to do."

"Hey! Hey! Wait up!" Fred stopped them as Sirius started heading to the door. "What about us?" he asked, pointing at himself and his twin.

"Yeah, you can't expect us to stay back here and do nothing," George added. "Those bastards used one of _our_ products to cover after themselves!"

Remus sighed. "Fred, George, you're not aurors, you're not part of the Order… you're too young."

"The hell we are," Fred replied, narrowing his eyes. "We're of age. We can join whenever we want to!"

"Your mother…"

George rolled his eyes. "Mom would still walk us around in our prams if she could," he said, turning to Sirius too, who'd been silent ever since they'd started protesting. "Ron and Ginny are at Hogwarts and so are a handful of our friends," he turned to Sirius, hoping to increase the effect of his words, "_Izzy_ included. Plus, we know that school better than most people – every secret passage, every quick escape…"

"We're just as useful there as you Marauders are," Fred finished. "You can't actually believe we'll stay behind even if you order us to."

It seemed like the discussion was over right there – they'd indeed be fooling themselves if they honestly believed Fred and George would listen to them telling them to stay behind… Besides, they had a point about knowing Hogwarts and being old enough: it was a fact that both Sirius and Remus had joined the Order when they exactly the same age as the twins, nineteen.

"Alright, then," Sirius told them, resigned with the argument. "Honestly, the Order needs to use all the help it can get. You two can start by helping me find Mia."

"What do you think of a cat?" Elizabeth asked as she observed a litter of small grey kittens snoozing inside a large willow basket by the shop's counter.

When, about ten minutes earlier, Elizabeth had declared that she just 'needed to drop by a shop' and insisted she came along, Mia had cringed and felt her blood turning into ice. She imagined the plush inside of Twilfitt and Tatting's Dress Shop and recalled one horribly long afternoon that had taken place many years before, during which a recently employed Elizabeth had dragged her best friends, Mia and Lily, into that very same shop in order to burn out half her first pay-check in an outrageously expensive. A dress, she recalled, intended for a date Elizabeth had been planning with her then boyfriend, later husband and current ex-husband, Ludo Bagman, father of the two blonde children standing a few feet away, entertaining themselves observing a cage full of hyperactive mice.

To Mia's relief, though, the shop Elizabeth had mentioned wasn't Twilfitt and Tatting's at all but instead the much more pleasant pet shop on Diagon Alley, where she wanted Mia's help to decide which pet to give Evie in her birthday, only a couple of weeks away.

"I suppose Evie might like a cat," Mia mumbled, looking at the kittens as well. "They're not as messy as dogs can be, I think. Not to mention that dogs cannot be taken to Hogwarts while cats can. It will save you from having to look after it for ten-months a year."

Elizabeth looked at her and smiled. "Says the experienced dog-owner in you, hum?"

Mia raised her eyebrows at first and it took her a couple of seconds to realize what her friend was saying. "Oh, I'll make sure to mention to Sirius that you called him a dog, though I doubt he'll feel insulted. Personally, I like to be referred as the wife of a guy who can turn into a dog at will – sounds more politically correct."

Elizabeth chuckled. "Of course it does. How is he doing, anyway? I barely had time to ask earlier. He seemed pretty eager to escape any chance of me dragging him into a shopping spree."

"Naturally. But he's alright," Mia said, sighing. "A bit edgy about the war, though, but who isn't, these days? The Dementors are what bother him the most. This is practically the first time he's here at London outside of the house since the attacks became more often."

The blonde sighed and nodded. "I heard about them. The auror department is having trouble keeping up with them all – they've already pulled the best trainees from the academy early because they're short-handed. I mean, you've seen the ones stationed here in Diagon Alley for crowd control today: half of them look like they belong in a classroom at Hogwarts."

"I noticed – I assumed they were still in training," Mia told her.

Elizabeth shook her head. "No. All legitimate aurors fresh out of the academy. It was like this last time too, wasn't it? James was pulled from training sooner as well, wasn't he? Lily wrote to me about it."

Mia nodded. "I remember – he was. Lily only wasn't pulled too because she got pregnant with Harry and they couldn't risk putting her in the front lines." She let out a low sigh at the memories before suddenly looking up at her friend with an eyebrow rose as a thought occurred to her. "Wait, how do you even know all of that? Did it come out in the newspapers?" She didn't recall hearing about that at all.

Elizabeth bit her lower lip. "No, it wasn't published. The reason why I know that is actually related to one of the reasons why I asked you to come here and meet me today, now that you mention it," she confessed.

"I thought you wanted to catch up."

"I did too. But I also needed to tell you something… and I guess there's no time like the present. Please don't be upset I didn't tell you earlier – it's more complicated that you think."

"What is it, then?"

The blonde took a deep breath, gathering her courage. "I'm…" she started.

Elizabeth wasn't able to finish, though, as suddenly their attention was turned somewhere else: one of the Weasley twins had just abruptly burst into the pet shop, apparently searching intently through the many present costumers until his eyes landed on Mia and he breathed in relief. Mia raised an inquisitive eyebrow at that.

He made a signal for her to approach before he took a step back through the still-open door, standing outside the shop for a moment, and shouted something that Mia could swear to be '_She's here!'_ to someone outside. Then, after the redhead stepped back in, Mia did approach him, with an equally confused Elizabeth on her heel.

"Hum… Fred?" She asked, unsure of which of the twins she was speaking to.

"George," he corrected, his voice rather humourless – strange, considering who it was…. "You'd got to come with me. Something happened."

Mia felt herself tense. His facial expression mixed with his words were enough to unsettle her. "What's wrong? Is it Sirius? Is he…"

He shook his head. "It's not Sirius. He's fine. Death Eaters. They're at Hogwarts," he told her shortly.

"_Holy Merlin, how's that possible?_" Mia heard Elizabeth saying by her side as she felt the tension become a dagger-like pain in her heart.

She swallowed hard. "Harry and Izzy…?" she dared herself to ask.

"Harry's not in the school: went somewhere with Dumbledore – no idea what or where, though. Izzy's fine as far as we know – she was the one who warned Sirius," George explained. "He's looking for you so we can all go to…"

"Take me to him," Mia requested before he was finished talking. She'd been expecting Harry to have to have to chase a Horcrux at some point, which was likely what he was doing at the moment; she also hadn't been naïve enough to believe the Death Eater attacks would be gone for good just because they'd been quiet lately and that the illusion of peace would last long either. She hadn't been expecting, though, for those two things to overlap…

George nodded and, before following him, Mia turned her face to Elizabeth for a moment – she could barely recall what they'd even been talking about before the news had came. "Are you coming?"

"Just as soon as I drop the kids at Ludo's mother's place," she said, nodding at the two children standing by the shop-keeper's side, petting a fluffy white rabbit in her arms.

Mia nodded, then, and without another word followed the redheaded boy outside. Thankfully, she didn't have to bother about needing to search for Sirius through the crowds of people celebrating the Harpy's first goal: her husband was already approaching with Fred when they left the shop and immediately reached for her hand.

As soon as he reached her, he spoke. "Hogwarts…"

"George told me," she assured him.

"You sure you want to go?" he asked her tentatively. Part of him hoped she'd stay home, safe, waiting for him to come back with good news.

"Don't even try to convince me otherwise," she warned him in a firm, no-nonsense tone. "Our daughter's in there. Harry may be arriving too any minute…"

Sirius shook his head – how could he bring himself to tell her to ignore those things when he felt just the same? "I won't. I won't try to change your mind." And with that, his arm snaked its way around her back and held her against him in a mutual-comforting fashion as they walked together.

They ended up apparating straight into Grimmauld Place with the twins and Remus, who later joined them, and, from there, they used the floo connection to Hogwarts that very few people were aware of in order to reach the school. Mia's office, where the connection ended, was dark now that dusk reigned outside and seemingly untouched by any sort of attack. They didn't let themselves hope it was a false alarm, though. They knew better.

"I need to go and find Dora," Remus announced as he reached for the door, turning to them for a moment. "Before she manages to get hurt again…" Merlin knew she did nearly every time she took part in a battle – he hoped one of these days it wouldn't be more than sprains, cuts and broken bones…

Sirius nodded understandingly – he'd do just the same if he was in his shoes. "Go, mate."

The twins ended up taking a different way from theirs too, opting to use the thick net of secret passages that served Hogwarts, hoping to locate the Death Eaters faster through there. "We'll send a message through a Patronus when we find them," one promised before they sped away, leaving Mia and Sirius behind to search on their own.

"Where do we start?" Mia asked her husband. There was no sign of any fight, battle or duel around but then again the school was enormous and they were only in the first floor…

"The main staircase," Sirius told her. "We can go anywhere from there."

He grabbed her hand and they ran towards it together. It felt foreign to cross those corridors and not run into a single student as it was usual – they hoped that meant they were hiding safely in their common rooms. They hoped Izzy was among those students, though Sirius still had a feeling that wasn't the case.

When they reached the main staircase, it became obvious a battle was really occurring, though it seemed to be taking place mainly in the upper floors for some reason. The sound of explosions, threats and mad fits of laughter echoed all over and, if they looked up, they could see the colourful lights of spells being cast at a distance – some were followed by screaming, others by sounds of objects shattering or exploding. They could only imagine the mess going on up there.

They resumed climbing up the stairs and, on their way there, ran into some members of the Order: Hestia Jones, Sturgis Podmore, Dedallus Diggle… Turned out, Dumbledore hadn't left the school without warning the Order and, just in case, he'd made sure a few Order members were monitoring the school grounds – what they hadn't been expecting was the Death Eaters infiltrating the school from within, which they hadn't realized until receiving the Silent Calling Remus had made.

By the time they reached the fourth floor, Mia noticed something odd through the archway that lead to that floor's main corridor, which seemed to be completely empty. A large statue of a hog was moving, revealing a small door underneath it – a secret passage that she didn't even know to exist. Then again, she didn't know many… Alarmed, Mia grabbed the sleeve of her husband's shirt and stopped his motion, giving him a quick glace and nodding at the statue. He saw it too. "_It leads upstairs_," Sirius mouthed since he apparently was aware of that passage.

They quickly, yet as silently as they could, approached it pointing their wands at the door as they half-expected some Death Eater to emerge from the other side of it – instead, seconds later they saw themselves pointing their wands and ready to attack their own daughter.

"Mom, Daddy," Izzy called as soon as her eyes landed on them and they lowered their wands.

"Oh, thank Merlin," Mia said as she reached forward and enveloped her daughter in a bone-shattering hug. Izzy was okay.

"Merlin, Izzy, you scared the living out of us," Sirius told his daughter. "Didn't I tell you to go to your common room and stay there?"

Izzy sighed as she pulled away from her mother. "Daddy, I…"

"Er… can we leave that discussion for later? We sort of need to come through here," a voice came from behind Izzy's form, revealing there was someone else with her.

She moved out of the way, revealing Neville standing behind her with Hannah Abbot, supporting a second-year Ravenclaw boy whose leg seemed to be badly broken. The two moved away from the little door and sat the boy on a nearby stone bench as a group of about a dozen other students ranging from first to fourth year and from every house exited the secret passage too. All of them were presenting small injuries consisting of several cuts, bruises, not half as serious as the boy's leg – mostly, they looked frightened and pale.

"Holy Merlin, what happened to them?" Mia asked

"Shrapnel," Izzy explained. "They were in a Gobstones club meeting up on the seventh floor, pretty close to where the battle's taking place. We ran into them and figured we should get them out of there before some Death Eater found them and did Merlin-knows-what with them."

"Yaxley saw us on our way here, though," Neville added, sighing. Both he, Izzy and Hannah had had a feeling that they should have waited a few more minutes before making their escape but they hadn't wanted to waste time when a battle was happening barely yards away – maybe they should have listened to the feeling since it came from the Felix Felicis, after all. "He tried to hit us with a few blasting hexes but missed. They hit the windows and a few lamps, though, and made them explode…" He nodded at the other students. "They were hit with some of the shrapnel."

"And none of you weren't?" Sirius asked in disbelief, looking at Izzy, Neville and Hannah who didn't have a scratch on them.

"We were lucky," Izzy told him without humour in her voice.

"What about the others?" Mia asked suddenly. "Ron? Hermione? Ginny?"

Izzy shook her head. "I don't know. Last we saw of Ginny, she'd gone to warn Ron and Hermione of the Death Eaters." She tried not to worry about them because they'd all taken the Felix and Ginny had the Marauders map with her… she couldn't help wondering where they were, though. "They were patrolling Snape's office…"

Sirius frowned – did that son of a bitch have anything to do with that attack? "Why?"

"Because Harry told us to – he doesn't trust Snape," Izzy said simply, not feeling like going further into that matter.

Mia looked down at the injured boy's leg. "He needs to go to the Hospital Wing," she said – the boy didn't say anything – he simply sat, very pale.

Neville shook his head, then. "We tried to get there. It's a mess near there. Curses flying everywhere, explosions… Running into the middle of that would be suicide."

"Where are you going then?" Sirius asked. "The great hall?"

"No, to my house's common room," Hannah Abbot announced. "We're trying to get everyone outside of their own dorms there. I ran into Professor Sprout and she said they were setting up a shelter down there. It should be safe – it's far from away from the battle, one needs a password to get in… Susan Bones and Ernie Macmillan went to get a few House Elves to help out with the injured."

"We could probably use someone who used to be a healer with us to fix them better, Mom," Izzy said, nodding at the group of students behind her.

"I…" she turned to Sirius and pulled him aside for a moment, standing a few steps away from their daughter. They had made a promise to each other: they'd walk into any fight _together_ and they would look after each other while in it. Deep down, she knew the right thing to do was going with Izzy and help those kids – there was no question in her mind about that as there was no doubt that she'd end up doing just that. It just terrified her, thinking of Sirius being out there, fighting on his own. Last time they'd been in such a battle, she'd nearly lost him just as he'd nearly lost her.

"Go with Izzy," he encouraged her.

"You just want me out of the way during the fight," she replied flatly.

It was true. He couldn't deny it. "Sure I do," he confirmed it. "But that doesn't change the fact that they need you more. Also doesn't change the fact that this way you can keep an eye on Izzy."

Merlin, she knew that. "Promise me you'll be okay, then," she demanded.

"You know I can't. I promise I'll do all I can to try, though," he offered instead.

She sighed and nodded, reaching to place a kiss on his cheek. "You'd better not."

He forced himself to give her a little smile and prepared to leave, shooting Izzy a warning look before he did so. "Stay with your mother. Don't do anything stupid," he warned her.

"Wait," she asked, approaching him as she reached for something inside her robes and removed a glass vial which seemed to be leaking through a crack. "Damn it!" she mumbled, only then noticing the dampness of her shirt wasn't sweat as she'd imagined. Between the leaked amount and what she'd shared with most of the DA and the Order, there was just enough for little more than one person… "Drink this," she said, handing it to her father – hopefully, since her mother was coming with her, she wouldn't need as much… "Just one gulp."

"What is it?" he asked her sceptically.

She shook her head. "Just trust me. I'll tell you afterwards," Izzy declared. "Please, Daddy!"

He seemed hesitant. "Tell me something first," he said cautiously. "What did you do when you saw me for the first time?"

It wasn't a random question. Being handed an unknown potion to drink during a battle was odd enough – he needed to make sure who was offering it to him was really someone he trusted and not an imposter that had taken polijuice potion, thus asking his daughter something only them and their most trusted friends knew – Izzy understood that herself. "I helped you escape from the Gryffindor tower. You were still on the run and Percy had gone to call the teachers because you had snuck into Harry's dorm room with a knife – when I helped you, you had no idea who I was."

He nodded and, satisfied with the answer, took a full gulp of the potion. Then, he waited a couple of seconds to see if anything happened and when nothing did, he handed the bottle to Mia, who drank the rest after Izzy gave her a nod. "Well? What was it?"

"Felix Felicis."

Sirius raised his eyebrows. "Then why didn't you say it right away?"

"Because you'd have told me to give it all to Mom and she's not to one who's about to walk into a battle," Izzy explained.

"She has a point," Mia agreed.

He narrowed his eyes. "Did you drink this too?" he asked Izzy.

"Yes," Mia told him. "Most of the old DA did. Some members of the Order too."

Sirius nodded, relieved – at least that comforted him a little about their safety. "Alright, then. All of you, be…"

"…careful," Mia finished for him. "You too." She reached for his hand and gripped it one last time before letting go of it.

As she watched her husband speed away, Mia gave herself a moment to take a deep breath and pray he would be alright. And then, gathering her strength, she turned to Izzy the group of students behind her. "Alright, let's get you all safe and fixed."

He'd never take Felix Felicis before that day, though he couldn't tell he and James hadn't been tempted to snuck some of it from Slughorn's potions stash back in the day – that was, right before the Marauders Map had been confiscates in their seventh year… It was amazing, yet so very risky. Some said if one didn't follow the whispered advice the potion gave them, if one became too confident… all could go wrong. Luck could become doom. Risk too much and handle the consequences. He wasn't sure if it was _that _strict but he wouldn't test it right now.

That was why he religiously followed every whisper, every 'feeling' he got. He wasn't sure why the potion told him to turn left when the staircase that led up to the battle's floor was on his right or why it made him go down one floor just so he could take some secret passage that landed him on the sixth floor little less than ten yards away from where the stairs would but took twice the time to do so. He didn't quite understand why his instinct was to disarm the first Death Eater that showed up running in his direction, some bloke name Gibbon, instead of stunning him until the guy was struck by a killing curse that another Death Eater, Rowle, had cast towards someone else – someone else who happened to be Remus Lupin and who would certainly be dead if it wasn't for the Felix.

After that, he didn't hesitate in aiming his wand towards Rowle, casting a stunner exactly at the same time as Remus did too and sending the Death Eater flying for several feet until he hit a wall.

"That was close, mate," Sirius told his friend, who was still staring at Gibbon's body on the floor.

He nodded. "I know. I… I've got to…" he pointed at Tonks, who was busy duelling with two Death Eaters at the same time a few feet away, meaning he needed to go help her.

Sirius nodded, intending to make his way to the seventh floor, as he recalled someone telling him that was where most of the Death Eaters were. He turned around, planning to make his way to the stairs and then, at the very end of the corridor, he saw him.

The rat, the traitor, the man who, for so long, he'd allowed himself to hate even more than Voldemort himself. Because unlike Voldemort, Sirius had once trusted this man, even loved him as a part of his family and one of his best friends. And what had he gotten in return? Betrayal. Death. Nothing would ever taste as bitter.

For a second or two, Sirius stood there unmoving, as dangerous as it might be right in the middle of a battle, just watching, trying to register that the great opportunity to get back at that bastard (as he'd been wishing to for so long) might have finally arrived. Why the other Death Eaters had brought him along was something he couldn't phantom... odds were that, like Rodolphus had, they didn't give a rat's arse if he lived or died. Most likely, they were hoping for the latter.

And they didn't seem to be the only ones: there, at the end of the corridor, Wormtail was fighting McGonagall… or rather trying to hide from her continuous curses and hexes behind some statue of a highly praised twelfth century headmaster of Hogwarts.

It all happened very fast from then on. Praised or not, seconds later the stone headmaster was blown to pieces and Wormtail had nowhere else to cower behind. He went almost as blank as thick December snow and his next movement, brought recognition to Sirius's eyes: he was trying to turn into his animagus form. Unsucessfully. Dumb or not, Wormtail should have realized he was duelling with an expert on transfiguration: if there was anyone who knew exactly how to stop an animagus from morphing, it was Minerva McGonagall. And that was exactly what she did. One might have thought it was a stunner since it was just as red but the traitor didn't fall down inanimate, he just looked at McGonagall in horror, unable to morph and then at Sirius, finally taking in his presence. Not a second passed before he motioned to run.

Sirius hadn't realized he'd been running towards Pettigrew and McGonagall, urged by the whisper of the Felix Felicis in his mind, until he saw himself passing in front of the latter and shouting that 'Wormtail was his'. There was no reply of protest from the deputy headmistress and Sirius simply kept running after him.

Wormtail wasn't very far ahead of him – ten, eleven yards' way, that quickly reduced to not more than five as Sirius was faster than Pettigrew at any rate. If he didn't get any closer was because Wormtail knew he was being followed and kept using his wand to throw all sorts of objects into Sirius's way, which he kept having to dodge. They went up the stairs, ran along corridors after corridors, passed by a number of duels whose intervenients Sirius didn't really have a mind to recognize… his eyes were set on the goal and that goal was Wormtail.

Courtesy of his little dose of liquid luck, any curses aimed at him missed him – some by several feet, others by a mere inch. It was only later that he would realize how many of them were emerald green. Wormtail wasn't so lucky to escape them all… At some point his silver hand, replacing the one he had sliced to bring his master back to the world of the living, was hit by some sort of orange spell which caused it to melt and sent his wand flying for several yards until it hit a wall and broke in a half. He was unarmed now.

Desperation seemed to cloud the traitor's mind even further as he took a turn to a seventh floor corridor that was known by everyone to be a dead end: no exits, not even secret passageways…. He wasn't just unarmed – he was trapped.

By the time Wormtail realized that too, he was already in some classroom with Sirius standing between him and any chance of a successful escape. In a last attempt to run, he tried once more to morph into his rat form, which didn't work. McGonagall's spell was still active.

"What, Wormtail? Can't turn?" Sirius asked him in a spiteful mocking tone. It was really happening: he couldn't escape now. Between McGonagall's curse and his lack of a wand Peter Pettigrew was finally at his mercy. This time, Sirius thought, he would get what he deserved.

But what did he deserve? It would have been so easy to kill him. Yet this time he was sane enough to know doing that wouldn't be right… Not because of any mercy for Wormtail but because of Sirius's own family. If they hauled him to Azkaban because of it, this time they would have a real reason to condemn him – he'd never see his wife and his kids. What would Mia think of him doing it? Killing Wormtail. He'd hurt her enough last time he'd tried to do so… One thing was killing someone out of need or self defence. Another one was doing it out of revenge. It tainted the soul. Harry had once told him his father wouldn't have wanted his best friends to become murderers for him – he was right. And why kill him, Sirius thought, when spending years in the hands of the Dementors would be so much worse to bear…

"How does it feel, Wormtail?" he finally asked his former friend, watching every little movement his face made, forming expressions of fear, hate… but never regret. That simple fact disgusted him. "How does it feel to know that, so soon, you'll finally end up where you should have been all this time? In Azkaban."

Wormtail trembled at the very name and his tiny beady eyes opened wide. Sirius could tell he was fighting not to look terrified. "The… half the Dementors… are on our side…" he stuttered.

In return, Sirius shrugged. "There's always the other half," he told him casually. "I promise it will be almost as painful as if they were all there."

"Why… why don't just… kill me?" the traitor asked, trembling. He knew pleading wouldn't do him any good that time – he'd already used that card back when Sirius had blown his cover as the Weasley boy's pet rat. He'd rather die than spend the rest of his life in that horror within Azkaban. "Kill me… be done with it…"

"I might just," he told him. "But I don't think I want to make it that easy for you. Tell me something first. Is it true what Lestrange told me? Did you put a hit on Mia? Did you want her dead just to make me suffer?"

Wormtail was very quiet, then – there was surprise in his eyes, not denial. Sirius imagined he had no idea Lestrange had spilled his guts and given him away before being kissed soulless. He also knew an admission of truth when he saw it. He wondered if it was the Felix what was making him so sure of that.

"Did you know she was pregnant back then?" Sirius spat. "I didn't but it wouldn't have mattered. If those bloody Death Eaters had managed to get her, you'd have been guilty for ending two innocent lives, you son of a bitch." He took a threatening step further and Wormtail took one back. "I lost thirteen years of my life because of you. I missed my daughter growing up."

The other man gulped. "Kill me, then, if you hate me so much."

He might just. He really might. But he was rational enough to know that wasn't what he really wanted. "Like I'd let you have it that easy… Why? Why did you hate us so much? We always had your back, we taught you pretty much all you know about magic because you were too thick to learn it in classes. What the hell was your problem?"

Pettigrew pursed his lips together. "You had it all and I had nothing. Especially you and James. You were smart, you were popular, people _loved_ you. And what was I? Nobody. Your charity case, many said."

"And how is that our fault? We offered you friendship – you didn't have to take it if it made you feel bad!"

"The Dark Lord offered me power."

Sirius chuckled disdainfully. "Well, I hope you enjoyed it, then. 'Cause after all you did I'm handing you to the Dementors on a silver platter."

This time, Wormtail didn't hide the fear in his eyes. He looked around the room, searching for a miracle, a weapon… some leverage that might let him escape. There was nothing.

"Cheer up, _mate,_" Sirius told him. "If you're lucky they'll kiss you before locking you up and then you'll be too empty to care where you are."

Wormtail shook his head over and over. And his eyes became fixed on the window. It was the only way out but they were on the seventh floor. He'd never live through a fall… but he'd never go to Azkaban either. So, the choice was made. He turned to Sirius one last time. "I'm not going to Azkaban." And he made a run for the window, jumping and breaking his way through the glass.

Disbelieving, Sirius ran towards the window after him, looking down through the hole on the glass. He was there at the bottom dozens of feet under the window illuminated only by the light of the first quarter moon – quiet, unmoving… dead. The bastard was _dead_. "Son of a bitch!" he shouted. Pettigrew had gotten his easy way out in the end, after all: he was dead and he wouldn't be going to Azkaban. It didn't really feel like justice to Sirius – even seemed pale, compared to the thirteen years Sirius had spent in what he could only compare to hell. "I hope you rot for all eternity, wherever you go now," he snarled, looking down at the body. And then, he motioned to get away from the window.

Something caught his eye before he could, though. A green light up on the Astronomy Tower followed by something falling down, moving downwards through the darkness of the night. No, not something. _Someone_. An endless moment passed before he realized who it was, through the glint of the long silvery beard reflecting the moonlight. That night, not only Wormtail was meeting his death, Sirius concluded, watching in disbelief as the limp form fell its way through the air like a rock.

So was Albus Dumbledore.

**A/N: Finally the internship is over and I'll be enjoying the rest of my Summer (not really Summer) break, which only ends this October. I hope you liked the chapter - I deleted half of it and rewrote it a few times. Hard one to come... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	26. Loss

**1 September 1971**

The hat had chosen and young Sirius Black was happy to comply. _Gryffindor_, he thought happily as he sat for the first time at the house's table in the Great Hall. It couldn't have landed him farther from Slytherin, could it? Maybe it was a sign of what he'd always felt deep down – he really didn't belong in his family. The so called 'Noble and Most Ancient House of Black'. The title itself made him roll his eyes.

Of one thing, Sirius was sure – he already felt like he _fit _there. In Gryffindor. He actually liked his fellow house-mates, though he had only met a few: the boy with messy black hair he'd sat with on the train whose name he recalled being James; the pretty brunette girl sitting by his side, Mia, who'd been the first to speak to him at the table and seemed rather nice; even those two other boys who'd sat opposite them on the table and he'd only exchanged a few words with so far, Remus and Peter… He was aware that only time would tell which relationships would last and which wouldn't – regardless, he could actually picture himself being happy as a Gryffindor.

His parents… well, they'd be another story. The simple thought of them filled his young mind with insecurities heavy enough to make him lose his appetite, no matter how delicious the feast opposite him looked. 'Upset' couldn't even begin to describe what they would feel when they heard the news. And that was bound to be soon, he thought, seeing as Narcissa was already sending him glares from the Slytherin table as she whispered something in a hushed tone to her older sister, Andromeda, who couldn't look less interested in what she was saying – unlike Narcissa, she gave Sirius an encouraging smile before hissing at her sister to shut up. He'd bet his whole share of the Black fortune that the first thing Cissy would do when she reached her dorm would be writing to his mother with a full report on his sorting into the house of Godric Gryffindor.

As long as he could remember, a very firm theory concerning magical segmentation had always been preached within his family – it could be described as sort of like a pyramid, now that he thought of it. At the top of it, were the oldest pureblood families, his own included, followed by the other purebloods in general but never (never!) the blood-traitors like the Potters or the Weasleys. While the first two made, so to speak, the class of the 'good ones', the third was bumped down to the lowest class of the 'bad ones'. The organization of those 'bad ones' was quite different: there was a level for the half-bloods and then another one that gathered muggles, muggle-borns, blood-traitors, squibs and all those sorts of wizard that they just didn't care for. Gryffindors, he recalled, usually were in the same pool as the latter ones with very few exceptions…

They did have that one coming, Sirius had to admit, especially after his parents had handed him in the previous night a list of the students he 'absolutely had to be acquainted with' and a list of those he wasn't supposed to even acknowledge. He'd been planning to do just the opposite but it seemed being a Gryffindor was an even bigger kick in their arses than doing that. He tried to see that as the bright side of the thing. _What will they do?_ He wondered. Demand he was re-sorted? Show up in the school to make their outrage known? He sure knew he should expect a howler by the following morning as he recalled mentioning to Mia earlier when they'd spoken.

But the slightly twisted pleasure he'd gained from trying to picture their outrage didn't last long. He knew his life at home would be even worse now. Bellatrix would never let him get away with being a Gryffindor without turning his life into a living hell. Could he live with it? Probably. It was just two months a year he had to spend at home, after all. Would it be easy on him? Hell no. Maybe they'd just kick him out, burn him out of the family tree like they'd done to members of earlier generations. He wasn't sure how to feel about that – maybe it was good because he'd be rid of them. But then again he'd have to fend for himself if that happened and he was just _eleven,_ for Merlin's sake. What if they sent him to some creepy orphanage?

The feast passed and his plate remained practically untouched, leading his new colleagues to ask him if something was wrong, to which he responded by saying an upset stomach was the problem. While they seemed convinced enough, the headmaster, who'd noticed his behaviour from the staff table, wasn't.

"Mr. Black, a word please," Albus Dumbledore requested later as the first years were about to be taken to their new dorms for the first time.

Sirius found it odd that the headmaster was addressing him already, yet didn't hesitate in approaching him. After all, if his parents didn't like him at all, he must be a pretty good bloke. But then, it occurred to him – _his parents_. Had they been so quick to learn about his sorting that they had already contacted the school demanding a re-sorting? _During _the meal? How did they even hear of it? "P…professor?" he asked as he joined the headmaster near the staff table

"I couldn't help noticing you seemed troubled during your meal," Dumbledore stated in a peaceful tone. "Did you not feel comfortable here at Hogwarts, Mr. Black? Or is it that you don't like the house you were sorted into? I understand most of your family became a part of Slytherin…"

"I'd much rather be where I am," Sirius told him bluntly without any hint of hesitation.

Dumbledore looked happy with his admission. "Oh, I see, then, Mr. Black. You are afraid your family won't accept the house the hat sorted you into."

_Can__ the man read minds? _he wondered. The smile he got in return from the headmaster after his unspoken question only led him to believe maybe he could… He nodded faintly, feeling fairly embarrassed and waited for a reaction.

"Why, I'm sure I'll be able to reason with them if necessary, Mr. Black," the older man assured.

"They're not easy to reason with," Sirius warned him almost casually.

"Then we're lucky I'm a patient man. One thing I can assure you, Mr. Black – any student's sorting is definitive. Nobody will be able to take you away from your house once you're in it. I'm afraid your family will have to get used to it – after all, what else can they do?"

"Kick me out?" he spoke without thinking.

The headmaster laughed, making Sirius feel further at ease. It was unusual – when someone laughed at him back home, he tended to feel uncomfortable, so much was the scorn behind it. "Oh, Mr. Black… I'm sure with time you will realize that some things just cause too much scandal for a respectable pureblood family such as yours to wish to deal with. Kicking their eleven-year-old firstborn out of their house is one of those things. I'd say being sorted into Gryffindor is not enough for them to risk it."

That point of view settled Sirius's mind, he had to admit – his mother was mental about keeping the family's image squeaky clean, though her notion of a 'clean image' was pretty different from a regular person's. Apparently, he wouldn't become homeless that night. He thanked Dumbledore for saying that – the bloke did know what he was doing as a teacher at least when it came to reassuring new students. His parents' view of the man was that he was 'too old to think straight' among some other non-flattering nicknames. Funnily enough, now, talking face to face with the man, Sirius couldn't help thinking that he was more sane than most of the people he usually dealt with daily.

"Yes, Mr. Black?" the headmaster asked as if he could once again hear his thoughts.

"Oh… I… it's nothing," he said, embarrassed.

"Oh, I'm sure 'nothing' wouldn't make you so contemplative, would it? Go on and say it, Mr. Black. I won't be offended."

Sirius was silent for a moment, under the headmaster's piercingly curious look and eventually concluded he might as well be honest and just say it. "My parents say you're…" he swallowed hard "… kind of a nutcase. I was just thinking they were wrong. I swear I was."

Dumbledore laughed again as if he'd just heard a good joke and patted his shoulder amicably. "Why, I'm very glad you think so, Mr. Black. You should join your classmates now. They are just about to walk out," he stated, nodding at the Great Hall's door.

Sirius nodded too and did as the headmaster said. As he rejoined the other Gryffindors, he couldn't help thinking that the old man was a hard one to figure out. Yet, he might just be one of the most brilliant people he would ever know.

**Present time**

Dumbledore was gone.

The thought itself seemed so foreign that, for a moment, as he stared out of the window, Sirius allowed himself to believe it was a joke. Dozens of scenarios crossed his mind in a matter of seconds: himself being wrong and the person falling not being Dumbledore but someone else remarkably similar to him… somebody using polijuice, maybe; an illusion created by the Death Eaters to mess with their heads; Dumbledore having somehow faked the fall and standing right there at the bottom of the tower, gathering himself and heading straight to the fight… but he wasn't. His body was down there, lifeless – at the bottom of the tower, the illumination was good enough for him to recognize it even at a distance, completely unmoving and awkwardly positioned.

Then, the truth was hard to deny: Albus Dumbledore was just as dead as Peter Pettigrew was. So far, three lives had ended at that battle. Likely only one, Wormtail's, would not be missed by any of the sides fighting…

Both were gone and there was little time to deal with the shock of it because if Dumbledore was in that school, despite dead, so would be Harry Potter – Sirius knew well enough the headmaster wouldn't have let Harry out of his sight until they were both somewhere safe. He wasn't sure how long he had spent in his initial disbelieving stupor (One minute? Ten? He couldn't tell – his notion of time passing seemed to have vanished sometime during his chase after Wormtail) but when the realization that Harry was nearby kicked in, everything happened very fast for Sirius.

The Felix guided him once again through the hallways, leaving behind the stage of his last confrontation with the (now dead) traitor and he hoped at every turn and every step that it was leading him to his godson or at least to something that would end up helping him get the boy to safety.

When he reached the seventh floor, he saw it was a mess of destruction. They hadn't been kidding when they said that was where the battle had been the hottest – the signs of it were clear: pieces of decorative armor spread everywhere, large bits of stone missing from the walls and cluttered all over the floors, curtains turned to ashes from having caught fire at some point… Apart from the signs of destruction it had left behind, the battle seemed to be reaching an end with only a single duel still taking place there on the corridor as far as Sirius could see: that one was featuring the Weasley twins fighting together against a Death Eater that was easily twice their size – the fact that there were two of them against him seemed to even things out. All in all, the situation looked handled, so Sirius decided to move on from there, heading to the sixth floor, then – there was no time to waste.

When he reached the nearest stairs, he looked down through the well formed between the staircases mostly to check if there was any sign of the battle having moved down to the lower floors, which didn't seem to be the case. Instead, before he had a chance to resume heading to the sixth floor, he saw a familiar flash of long red hair going down the stairs at the bottom, near the third or second floor, apparently heading to the castle's exit – it must be Ginny, he concluded, though he couldn't imagine why she was running down there apparently on her own. He didn't have the time to figure it out either, he thought, hoping the Felix Felicis would be enough to keep his godson's girlfriend protected during whatever she was going to do.

Heading to the sixth floor at some point while following the Felix Felicis's whispers, Sirius saw himself on the same hallway where some time ago he'd nearly coincidently saved Moony from being hit with Rowle's Killing Curse. Neither Remus or Tonks seemed to be there at the moment.

Instead, he spotted Bill and Charlie Weasley engaged in a duel each a few yards away, as well as Ron and Hermione, also close, managing to dodge with finesse the last curses aimed towards them by the Carrows who seemed to be retreating and finally… He felt something shifting inside him as he saw her and nearly smirked, pleased at the chance to take a hit at her. It was Bellatrix.

She stood near a doorway on the opposite side of the hallway, ready to leave with the others. By the time she saw him from the corner of her eye, it was too late for her to even try and attack him without risking being blown to pieces as his curse was already making its way to her. This time, he hadn't hesitated as had happened in the previous year. "_Reducto!_" he'd shouted loudly a fragment of a second earlier, aiming his wand towards his most detested cousin.

She managed to escape the curse itself by a few inches – he'd had a feeling she would from the angle he'd cast it. That was exactly why he hadn't used a stunner: unlike the Reductor Curse, stunners didn't cause an explosion and one of those was exactly what he wanted. Because while Bellatrix might have been quick enough to escape the curse itself, the impact of it blowing up part of the nearest wall, as well as a considerable amount of shrapnel that it released, sent her flying a few feet, hitting the floor violently before she was showered with the debris. It wasn't even close to how long she'd sent Mia flying but he wasn't about to waste his freedom by using dark magic to blow her apart. He'd gone through that dilemma with Wormtail already and the decision would be the same. The reducto-induced explosion was enough payback. For starters, of course.

Starters were all he got, though, as all of a sudden everything turned pitch black. For a moment, he thought he'd gone blind and wondered if he's been hit by some sort of spell without noticing it – the Felix wouldn't allow that, would it? He'd followed its feelings and whispers religiously! But soon he realized he wasn't the only one in the dark as he heard Charlie loudly cursing and calling them cowards for doing such a lame escape with Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder. For the second time this bloody night, Sirius added in his mind.

By the time the darkness dissipated, a couple of minutes later, all Death Eaters (Bellatrix included, probably carried by one of the others since he was positive he'd injured her wnough for it to be a while before she could make such a fast escape) were gone from the hallway and Merlin knew how far they might have gone already.

"Damn it!" he cursed under his breath. At least that group of Death Eaters – Bellatrix, her brother-in-law, Rabastan, the Carrows and Yaxley, he recalled – was surely way beyond their reach now, even though Bill and Charlie didn't waste time before leaving on a pale attempt to still find and catch them…

"You two okay?" Sirius managed to ask Ron and Hermione when they approached him.

Ron was the one to nod. "They missed every time they tried to curse us," he stated. "Did Izzy give you the Felix?"

Sirius nodded. "Yeah, she did. Not quite the effect I'd expected, though." Felix or not, that day was _not _going great for him. First Wormtail had escaped being captured by offing himself, now Bellatrix had escaped with her pals! Didn't sound like much luck to him…

"Well, the potion isn't widely used in battle-scenes with so many unexpected dangerous situations, not to mention that it doesn't always make things happen in the most obvious way…" Hermione explained quickly. "I'm sure if you look at the big picture, you'll see you were pretty lucky today. I mean, all three of us have been in the middle of a violent battle and none of us got a single scratch."

He couldn't deny she had a point. In the previous year at the Department of Mysteries, practically everyone had gotten injured in some way, which he definitely wasn't the case at the moment. Bella couldn't say the same. Even if she'd escaped, he'd at least gotten a chance to leave a mark on her with that little flight… he hoped every bruise and every break would sting like the bitch she was for weeks and give her a little bit of that payback he wanted her to get so much. Later, he might think that, in essence, the Felix had done its job too in Wormtail's case too, though at the moment he found his fate harder to sawllow. Faced with that, he changed the subject. "So, the Death Eaters… what made them start to retreat? Doesn't sound like them to leave us without causing major injuries…"

Hermione sighed. "I know. They just started retreating a few minutes ago. Someone shouted 'it's done' and they started backing off and getting ready to leave. Can't tell what they meant with that massage, though."

Sirius had a feeling he could. _Dumbledore_, he thought. Killing him must have been what the Death Eaters had come to the school for, their master's orders. Mission accomplished: get the hell out like the bloody cowards they were. He couldn't bring himself to explain that to the others, though – it was hard enough to believe in his head that the leader of their movement was gone, much less saying it out loud. "Have you seen Harry?" he managed to ask instead.

It was a relief when Ron nodded. "He passed here running about fifteen minutes ago. He was chasing after Snape and Malfoy."

There was an angry pause, then. "Snape?"

"He was really fighting on _their _side the whole time," Hermione announced in an angry, yet resigned tone. "Stunned Professor Flitwick right under our noses too."

He pressed his lips together and his hands closed into fists. _The double faced son of a bitch_. He'd known it. He'd never trusted the bastard and he'd always had a feeling that doing it would only lead them to being kicked badly on the arse at some point. How right had he been? Just thinking Dumbledore had trusted him all that time… "And Harry was chasing him? Alone?" he asked, feeling the weight of fear within him.

"Yeah," Ron replied before pausing. "I mean, no. Tonks went after him to make sure he wouldn't… you know, get killed. It was like he was possessed. Barely stopped to say anything – only took the time to stun some bloke who was trying to curse the wits out of Ginny. She went looking for him a few minutes ago when the Death Eaters started to retreat. It was impossible to get through them before."

"I saw her going," Sirius told them shortly, motioning to walk away – Harry must be downstairs if Ginny was heading there. He vaguely remembered Izzy mentioning the redhead had the Marauders map with her, so she would know…. "You guys should go somewhere safe… the Hospital Wing is probably reachable now – the Order can handle the rest if the fight. I'll go looking for Harry."

They were tired enough of the fight to simply nod without arguing, heading in opposite directions from Sirius as he sped away, heading downstairs.

That time, the only presence of Death Eaters he was able to note was the one of the unconscious and tied up ones, around half a dozen, that a couple of Aurors was keeping an eye on, somewhere on the fifth floor. Down at the third one, he ran into Bill and Charlie again and didn't need more than their faces to know that, as expected, they hadn't been able to catch up with the group they'd been chasing.

More and more stairs followed. They seemed endless, he thought. He just wanted to reach the bottom of them… When he did and reached the entrance hall, he saw a group of students being guided upstairs by Porfessor Sprout, all of them emerging from the door that he remembered leading to the corridor where both the kitchens and the Hufflepuff dorms were located. He made a mental note to go look for Mia there later, after he'd located Harry.

He didn't need to go further than the castle's main doors to spot him. Right outside, Harry was walking towards the castlewith Ginny by his side and Tonks led the way several yards in front of them. While the eyes of the former two were dry, Tonks's were red and watery. It occurred to Sirius that he'd seen her injured, he'd seen her sad and even miserable, back when Remus had been rejecting her. He'd never seen her crying, though. The possible meaning of it scared him.

He stood unmoving, waiting as she approached before asking anything. "Remus?"

She shook her head. "'t's not him," she said, her voice muffled. "He's with Hagrid outside, helping him moving the bo…" She gulped. "Dumbledore. He's dead."

He nodded soberly. "I know."

She wiped the tears with the sleeve of her shirt. "I need to go warn Kingsley and Moody… McGonagall too. She has to reset the school wards to her command. She'd the headmistress now." She took a breath and gripped her own hips with her hands. "Right. Harry's pretty shaken up. Talk to him." And with that, she was gone.

Harry was already stepping in with Ginny when Sirius turned back to them. His expression numb and lost and the redhead gave Sirius a concerned look as soon as her eyes met his.

"Are you okay?" Sirius asked his godson.

"Yeah… no. I dunno" Harry mumbled, his tone almost disoriented – he seemed exhausted, Sirius noted. And had plenty of cuts, scratches and bruises, probably resulting from both his adventure outside of school and the battle itself – had he even taken the Felix? "Dumbledore is…"

"I know. I saw him falling," Sirius interrupted him – he didn't bother to mention he'd just seen Wormtail fall into his death too. It didn't seem fitting at the moment.

"Oh," his godson said faintly.

"Maybe you should sit down," Ginny suggested in concern, guiding her boyfriend to a nearby stone bench. She didn't like at all how pale he looked, how shaken he sounded. She had no doubt he's get past it – Harry always did. But seeing him like that put a heavy weight in her heart, made her hate everyone that caused him such pain.

"He was already gone when he fell, though…" Harry added, his hands gripping the edge of the bench as he spoke. When he looked up at Sirius's eyes, he didn't seem disoriented anymore. Just tired. And angry. And grieving. "Snape killed him. I saw it." He said that through his teeth, nearly in a whisper even though Ginny and Sirius were the only ones close enough to hear what he said.

His godfather froze – that was beyond the worst kind of betrayal he'd imagined coming from Snape. "What?" he asked in disbelief.

"He didn't stand a chance," Harry continued, looking down at his hands now – at how Ginny's own hands joined his, warming them when he hadn't even realized how cold they felt. It helped a little, though, at the same time, didn't change a thing. "He was unarmed and weakened by a potion he had to drink… He wasted his last chance at using his wand before Malfoy came and disarmed him to make sure he and the other Death Eaters wouldn't spot me up there in the Astronomy tower with him – immobilized me under the invisibility cloak." His eyes fell to the cloak that was now resting on Ginny's lap but quickly looked away, remembering those long moments he'd spent watching, unable to act… "Dumbledore had been asking me to fetch Snape to help him like he was his… most trustworthy friend or something. But when he came…" he stopped talking, sighing instead as Ginny gripped his hand.

"I'm sorry," she whispered to him softly.

Meanwhile, Sirius was still in disbelief. That seemed to be a recurrent feeling for him that day… One thing was Snape betraying the Order for the Death Eaters… taking their side, whatever. It wasn't like he hadn't been expecting it. But killing the man that had for so long put his faith on him? Given him the life he'd had for the past fifteen years… He might have always detested Snape with a passion but that was a whole new level of cruelty that he had never attributed to the guy. The simple thought disgusted him.

"He's the Half Blood prince," Harry recalled, his voice strained with a hint of anger, making Sirius look back at him suddenly. His face looked to have regained a bit of colour already, though he seemed just as exhausted through the expression of resentment on his face.

"Who?" Ginny asked, worried.

"Snape," he said, spitting the word like it was a curse.

"How do you know?" Sirius asked.

"That spell for enemies in the book… Sectumsempra…" He turned to Ginny, then. "I used it… or tried to. I just wanted him punished for what he'd done and it came to my mind… I know I'd promised I wouldn't use any spell from the book that I didn't know already…"

She shook her head. "Don't be stupid. You were in the middle of a battle – neither I nor anyone will blame you for using that spell under the circumstances."

Harry nodded, then and Sirius spoke.

"So, he recognized the spell?" he asked.

"Yes – he even managed to escape it. Then, he started yelling, asking how I dared to use the spell he'd created himself against him… that he was the Half-Blood Prince." Just thinking of it made him want to set the book on fire, just as he wanted its old owner to suffer the same fate. "It's always him, isn't it? He's the Half-Blood Prince, Dumbledore's murderer, the one who heard the prophecy…"

Before Sirius could even ask about what he meant about the prophecy, he heard rushed steps behind him followed by his wife's voice calling for Harry. By the time he turned around, she was rushing towards them, hugging Harry, who'd gotten up at some point, very tightly as soon as she reached him.

"Thank Merlin you're back," she said before pulling away, her eyes watery, yet not dripping tears as she stepped back. "We were transporting the injured from the Hufflepuff's dorms to the Hospital Wing when Tonks ran into us and told me you were here. I had to come. How are you feeling? Did you get hurt?" Mia examined him with her eyes from head to toe as she fired the questions.

"Only a few cuts and scrapes. Nothing serious," he replied shortly, his tone still lower than usual.

"What were you doing outside, for Merlin's sake? And where is Dumbledore? Wasn't he supposed to be with you?"

Her question was answered with heavy silence from both Sirius, Ginny and Harry. Again, the latter looked down, facing his sneakers absently.

Sirius was the first to speak, afterwards, placing a hand on his godson's shoulder. "Look, how about you and Ginny head up to the Gryffindor tower? Mia and I will drop by later to check on you, okay?" He didn't really feel like putting the kid through explaining the whole thing to Mia all over again – they would ask him for the full story later… or rather in the following day. The kid had already been shaken enough for a day, after all.

Harry looked up and nodded. "Okay."

"Come on," Ginny urged him, pulling him by the arm to walk with her. When they were about to reach the main staircase, she wrapped her own arm around his back and rested her head on his shoulder, hoping the closeness of the gesture would bring him some comfort at least.

As soon as the pair disappeared up the stairs, Mia turned to her husband, her eyes showing fear. "What's wrong with Dumbledore? Why isn't he with Harry?"

He bit his lower lip before speaking – it was still heard to say it out loud. "Mia… he's gone."

"Gone?" she asked, frowning in confusion. "He had to leave again? Didn't he just come back?"

He shook his head – deep down, he knew she wouldn't even consider he might be dead until he said it bluntly. "Love, he's gone… as in dead."

Silence came and she just stared right into his eyes, waiting for him to laugh and tell her it was some sort of sick joke he'd picked up somewhere or to do just anything that would prove him wrong. He didn't. "No," she mumbled. "No… shut up, Sirius, that's ridiculous! Dumbledore cannot be…" She found herself unable to say the word. "He's _Dumbledore_!" She very nearly laughed at the idea.

"It's not a joke," he assured her.

"It's impossible!" she replied.

He closed his eyes for a moment and huffed. "Mia, listen to me. _Harry_ saw it happening," he told her, knowing it would make an impact on her. "He stood there at the astronomy tower, completely immobilized by Dumbledore himself under his invisibility cloak and watched as _Snape_ killed him. I saw Dumbledore falling from up there afterwards. He's gone, Mia, whether you believe it or not."

"No, that's…" She stopped herself, taking one step back away from him and covering her mouth with the back of her hand like she was feeling sick. "Oh… oh Merlin," she whispered, looking her husband in the eyes again, feeling numb. "Snape did…" She closed her eyes and shook her head like she was trying to process so many thought at the same time that they were making her dizzy. "Harry saw it?" she asked as soon as her eyes were back open. "The whole thing?"

Sirius nodded. "That's why he'd so shaken up." He took a breath, then. "I think so. Merlin, Mia…"

She stopped him before he could refer to it again – she couldn't think of it. Not now. It was too much. "Has anyone else been killed?"

He sighed. "From our side, nobody else that I'm aware of was. From theirs… at least two. Gibbon and…" he gritted his teeth, "and Wormtail."

Her mouth opened, forming a perfect 'O' but she didn't speak for several seconds. So many thoughts followed that statement, one of which terrified her to the core. She had to ask. "Did you…?"

He didn't need her to finish the question to give her an answer – he'd been expecting it, in fact. He was glad he could deny it truthfully, at least. "He did it to himself. Took a flight out of a window – didn't like the idea of spending the rest of his life with the Dementors. Who does?"

Feeling a hint of pain behind his voice, she took a step in his direction and rested her hand on his arm, intending to give him any words of comfort she could think of. Nothing came. Her head was a mess, her emotions likewise – it formed a whirlwind that she just wished she could stop. Too much at the same time, too close to driving her mad. She could only hope he had interpreted the slight grasp of her hand around his arm and a little sign of support as the words wouldn't come.

He reached for her hand in return, grasping it too, which confirmed her hopes. It didn't help much bit with the hurricane of emotions going through her mind but at least she knew they were on the same page.

"We should go… check on Harry," she said absently a few seconds later.

Sirius nodded, feeling equally poor in terms of words. "We should."

And without another word to clear the air or to ease each other's minds, they walked together through the signs of destruction left by the battle towards the Gryffindor tower. Neither of them was really feeling like themselves at the moment.

**A/N: Back from a surprise vacation in the south of Spain very refreshed... Sorry for the delay bit I hadn't been expecting it. Anyway, I hope you liked the chapter - it wasn't as fast-paced as the last one but, well, it was needed. ****Feedback is very welcome! Review!**


	27. Insomnia

**A/N: Well, I'd been intending to add the conversation with Harry in this chapter but then looked at my notes (yeah, I have notes) and realized that part would fit better in the general tone of next chapter (kind of seemed like an appendix in this one). So, here's a whole Sirius & Mia chapter.**

It was clear enough that sleep didn't want anything to do with her that night, Mia concluded later on the night of the battle as she lay in her bed with Sirius. It was sometime around three in the morning and there were still too many thoughts – the bad kind of thoughts – haunting her mind and not allowing her to rest even though she felt so helplessly tired.

She knew she had to think of something else or she'd go mad. Nobody but… she swallowed hard just from thinking of it. Nobody but Dumbledore had been killed from their side, which was always a positive thing. Some injuries, sure, but they were more uncomfortable than serious: the worst of them had been Kingsley Shacklebolt, who'd broken a few ribs thanks to his stunt of refusing the Felix Felicis so other less-experienced members of the Order and the DA could have it instead. Some had seen his action as selfless and brave while others, namely Elizabeth, who'd been in charge of healing him, had called it a 'pigheaded and plain stupid move' – it wasn't like he'd been the only one doing it, since Mad-Eye among other sounding names within the Order had done the same…

Outside of it, the few injured students that had escaped to the Hufflepuff dorms had been healed by herself and, surprisingly, Izzy too. Her daughter had shown herself quite useful with the healing and had mastered the basic bruise-removing and minor laceration-treating charms, among other ones, quickly enough to both surprise Mia and to help a number of her colleagues. Who knew, maybe Izzy would find her way in the career her mother had grown tired of, Mia mused to herself, feeling slightly proud of her. But while those students had been patched up easily enough, Harry was another case…

There was no denying that he'd been looking better physically by the time she and Sirius had left the school: less pale, bruises and cuts healed and more… reactive. But there was still a haunted look in his eyes – a look she'd seen before, back when he'd watched Cedric being killed in the Triwizard tournament. It seemed almost like a mirror of that situation, except that instead of it being a boy he was slightly friendly with that he'd watched dying, it had been the man who'd essentially become his mentor… He must be feeling terrible, Mia knew. But at least he was getting his rest now, after Ginny had 'talked him into' taking a dreamless sleep potion shortly before Sirius and Mia had came back home, around midnight.

Helping with the searches throughout the whole castle to make sure no Death Eater that hadn't either been killed or captured had stayed behind to surprise them and making sure all students were accounted for (only Malfoy, as expected, had been missing from every count) was what had kept them in the school so late. Some had stayed even later but the need to get Alex and Mary from Molly's care had spoken higher. It came to Sirius and Mia as a blessing that those two had already been asleep by the time they'd picked them up from the Burrow and, consequently, had made no fuss when placed in their respective bed and cot for the night. And then, with the kids in bed and the house dead silent, they'd had gone to bed themselves.

In normal circumstances, she admitted, she and Sirius would have talked that night's heavy events through before; they would have made sense of it all together; they would have comforted each other afterwards; _then _they would have gone to sleep with the weight resting on their chests lighter. Yet, none of it came up. Later, they would ask themselves why. It wasn't because they were angry at each other or anything – it seemed the most natural answer was that both their minds still needed time to process the events that had taken place earlier before speaking of them… They just didn't seem to be able to talk about any of it yet and hoped sleep would clear their minds.

Needless to say that wasn't the case_._ For her because sleep didn't come at all; for Sirius, though she didn't know it at the moment, because sleep came filled with images of Pettigrew laughing at him, glorious from getting his end at his own terms… then, Bellatrix doing the same for getting her chance to escape… and finally Dumbledore's body being hit by the green light and falling down from the high tower over and over again. Mia sighed – the universe didn't really seem willing to give them a break, even for just a few miserable hours.

The wakefulness was getting more and more annoying by the second: fighting the urge to keep tossing and turning to try and find a position that would lead her to the so desired slumber was incredibly frustrating, yet Mia didn't want to wake her husband just so he'd have to go through the same.

At some point, she just couldn't take remaining immobile in the bed like that any longer and sat up, slipping out of it carefully before pacing a little in the room, trying to stretch her limbs, nearly numbed from the stillness. Walking around didn't help with the overdrive of thoughts in her mind but at least she could fight the tension that had taken over her body since that afternoon.

Eventually, she approached the window and opened the thick curtain covering it in order to peak through the glass into the street. It was empty, as expected, with several Muggle cars parked by the pavement. Did the owners of those cars have any idea of what was happening to the world? Of the danger they were in? Did they have any idea that the only man who the source of such danger feared had met his end only hours before? Probably not, she concluded, wishing she could be just as blissfully ignorant as they were.

It was like that that Sirius first saw her when he woke up from his unsettling dream. At first, still feeling the tension of the nightmare and with his eyes closed, he'd searched for her form on the bed, only to find an empty space by his side still warm from her recent presence. It had taken him a moment of confusion and opening his unfocused eyes to spot her there, by the window. A mere shadow against the street lights, yet one that he would recognize anywhere.

It wasn't working for her just as it wasn't for him, he thought. Avoiding the subject of what had happened that afternoon wasn't making it easier to deal with – it was just delaying it… That realization was his wake-up call: it was time they went back to dealing with things the way they usually did.

She didn't see him when he got up, so thoughtful her mind was, or even when he walked in her direction. It was only when he was standing right by her side, his hand reaching towards her cascading dark hair, pulling several strands of it to behind her back and exposing her neck to his soft kiss that she reacted to his presence. He'd almost expected her to tense when she felt him there but she didn't. Instead, Mia sighed and reached for his hand in order to shift it so his arm would surround her waist to bring them closer together.

"Are you okay?" he asked her in a mere whisper directed straight into her ear like he was murmuring a secret.

Mia didn't speak – just nodded without looking at him, her eyes still fixed on the outside.

"Liar," he whispered back – he didn't need to be facing her to know _that _was a fact. "If you were okay, you'd be in bed sleeping like everyone else is at this hour of the night."

"You are not in bed sleeping either. Why aren't you?" she asked in return, this time turning to face him. Her hand touched his jaw softly in a caress. "Are _you_ okay?"

He shrugged in return, taking her hand into his. "I've been better. Troubling dreams."

"Dumbledore?"

"Among others," he told her, pulling her towards the sofa so they could sit. He turned on the lamp resting on a table near his side of the sofa but made sure the light was dim – it was just so they wouldn't be talking in the dark. "Do you feel up to talk about it now? What happened this afternoon…"

She sighed, bending her legs over his lap as she took a lounging position on the sofa. "Not really. But, honestly, I think I _need_ to or else I'll go barking mad. Do you feel the same?"

"More or less," he responded, pausing afterwards for a few moments. "It's hard to believe he's gone, isn't it?"

Mia nodded slowly, her face solemn. "I think part of me believed he would outlive us all. I could just picture him there at the staff table, welcoming our… great-grandchildren to the school decades from now. Couldn't you?"

Sirius smiled sadly this time. "The bloke was timeless. I thought he'd last centuries."

"Do you think he knew?" Mia asked suddenly, looking at Sirius suddenly. "He'd been so different lately, like he was fighting against time. In a way it seemed he was preparing us all for a world without him. He said it so himself months ago."

"I dunno. I suppose he didn't see himself as a… superior entity the way we all saw him. That thing with his… hand." He motioned with his own, stiffening a little. "The corpse-looking one, I mean. An… 'injury' like that must make a person more aware of their…" He gestured again, unable to find the correct word.

"Mortality?" she asked.

"Exactly."

They remained silent for several seconds reflecting over that, Sirius's fungers absently tracing patterns on his wife's knee as he just looked at the infinite. He was brought back by her sigh, just in time to see her brushing a tear away from her face.

"It kills me that the last time I actually had an actual conversation with him was just to yell and accuse him of not being trustworthy because he hadn't told us about the Horcruxes on purpose," Mia confessed faintly.

Sirius sighed, seeing that thought was a large part of what was eating her up – he knew it was up to him to make it right for her. "Mia, he kept something important from you concerning your son – you had every right to be angry at him over that. You were hurt."

"I was too hard on him," she whispered, resting the side of her head against the back of the sofa. "I should have forgiven him when he tried to make it right by keeping us as informed as possible afterwards. Now I'll never have the chance to do it."

Her husband reached towards her hands, then, holding them in his own. "You weren't too hard on him, love. You were doing your job as a mom. One of the best I know, by the way, and definitely the only one I love with everything I've got." He brought one of her hands to his lips in order to kiss it to prove that fact. "By hiding the Horcruxes, Dumbledore was standing on the way of you protecting Harry, so you told him off and gave him a cold shoulder afterwards – big deal, Mia… If anything, that would have made him proud for having given Harry to someone who doesn't take crap from anyone, no matter how important they are, when it comes to being there for him."

She shut her eyes closed for a long moment and then reached forward to wrap her arms tightly around her husband's neck to keep herself from crying – she just hated doing it. He gathered her close in return, rubbing her back softly without saying a word – the closeness was enough for now.

"I'll always be in debt with him for that…" she confessed, her breath colliding with the side of his neck as she spoke. "Giving me Harry, I mean. And for so much more too: he saved my life when he sent me away; he was there for me when I came back with the kids; he helped setting you free… I could go on and on with this."

"I don't really think he kept track of people's debts to him," Sirius assured her as she pulled away slightly, returning to her former position, resting across the sofa. "Especially when they were his friends. But even if he did, I'm sure you raising Harry all this time would have repaid them all. We'll all keep repaying him by fighting back as hard as we can like we did today."

She nodded slightly, wiping the few hot tears that had fallen down from her eyes with the back of her hand again. "I always thought Hogwarts was impenetrable," Mia murmured. The fact that Death Eaters had been able to enter it made her feel so… violated. "I always thought that was the safest place for anyone to be."

"Who didn't?" Sirius asked numbly in return – neither the Order nor the Aurors still knew how the Death Eaters had gotten into the Room of Requirement and from there infiltrated the school. Sirius knew Malfoy had been behind it, though, judging by his godson's year-long suspicions about the blonde boy. How, however, was the mystery behind the whole thing. "They must have been planning the attack for a while. That was why they were so quiet. Calm in the middle of a war is never a good sign…"

Mia sighed. "They'd been intending to kill Dumbledore during this attack all along, hadn't they?"

Sirius nodded. "Yeah. They started retreating as soon as the word that he was gone spread. It didn't go so well on their side, though. I heard Mad-Eye saying he'd killed another one from their side and so had one of the Aurors: that makes four Deaths on their side. Add another four captured and that makes one hell of a loss for them. At least we can say that much."

From her spot, Mia looked at him silently for several seconds before speaking. "I'm sorry I had to ask if you'd been the one killing Wormtail," she told him. "It wouldn't really matter if you'd done it after all he's done."

"Yes it would," he replied in a matter-of-factly tone. "Killing someone for revenge changes you. I won't deny that I was tempted to just do it and be done with it but I couldn't because I didn't want to change myself like that. I didn't want to lose my family."

"You wouldn't have lost us," Mia told him without any hesitation. "You'll never lose us."

He smiled a little at her admission, at how much faith it showed her to have in him. But she needed to know the truth. "Would you have looked at me the same way if you knew I'd been cold enough to kill an unarmed man who was trapped in a room unable to defend himself? Because that was what he was in the end, a traitor or not."

She took a moment before speaking. "I would have still loved you." That was all she could promise him, faced with that reality. Truth was, she couldn't even imagine Sirius doing what he'd just illustrated, so she couldn't imagine her reaction to that either.

"But we wouldn't have been _us_, would we? Wormtail wasn't worth changing that," he told her, looking away as he absently reached for her hand again. "His blood wasn't worth tainting my hands with."

"No, it wasn't," she agreed softly. One year earlier he hadn't thought so and that had caused such a rift between them… It meant a lot for her that he regretted that mistake enough to learn so much from it –it had even made him grow as a person, she believed. Yet, something in his eyes told her he was still troubled – he might have made the right choice but justice had managed to not prevail that day… He needed to share his ghost just as much as she needed to share hers. "Tell me about it. Tell me how it happened," Mia requested, softly.

And that was what Sirius did. He told her everything he could recall from the moment they had gone on different directions to his final meeting with the enemy he'd once seen as a friend, trying to find his way through the memories that were blurred by the confusion that the battle had generally caused: how the Felix had sent him one way or another, strategically guiding him through the fight; how he had chased Wormtail for Merlin knew how long, only to end up with him trapped; how he had finally confronted him with the facts that had taken place decades before and how Wormtail had justified them with his unrequited hatred; and, finally ,how Peter Pettigrew had decided that death was a more desirable fate than being imprisoned for the rest of his life.

"Maybe I'm just being petty, but him dying doesn't really feel like justice after all he did to us and to Lily and James," Sirius said, his tone frustrated as he spoke, his eyes looking down at his lap.

Mia sighed and reached forward to touch the side of his face. No, it really didn't feel like justice – he'd kept the man she loved locked in a nightmare for over a decade, he'd gotten her best friends killed and had intended the same fate for her. But justice didn't always prevail in real life – only in fairytales and stories one told their children… "You're not being petty. At least he won't be able to hurt anyone else where he is now," she said softly. "We can always hope that over there there's a place for people like him to be punished."

A dry chuckle followed her words. "That's what I was wishing right before…" he paused, looking at her. "Before I saw Dumbledore falling from the Astronomy tower. I saw it through the broken window. It was so unreal…" He took a deep breath and his eyes darted away. "He was already gone when he fell – Harry told me so himself. Snape had already done his _job_." He spat the last part, disgusted at the thought.

It made Mia uneasy too. "I always imagined that, despite him being so nasty to Harry, there had to be some… good in him. Just enough to justify Lily having been so close to him when they were kids," Mia confessed. "It's true that a part of me never did and never would be able to fully trust him – not when you and Harry had so strong feelings against him. But _this_…"

"This was too cruel, even for him," Sirius finished for her, almost matter of factly. "Even I can see that and I've _hated_ the guy since I first lay my eyes on him. Harry said Dumbledore had been disarmed and was clearly weak from something that had happened during their out-of-school adventure. Snape must have seen that too and killed him anyway without thinking twice. He's got to be an even bigger cold-hearted bastard than we thought he could be to do something like _that_."

Mia sighed – either that was the case or something was very wrong with that story… It reslly didn't matter, did it? They've been betrayed, anyway, in the worst of ways. "I can't even begin to imagine what Harry must be feeling now after having seen that," she said, concerned. "He looked so… helpless when I first saw him with you. He looked better afterwards but still… a person can only take so much."

"He feels guilty too," Sirius stated – he knew guilt batter than anyone didn't he? For years at Azkaban the guilt he'd felt for switching places with Wormtail as secret keeper, leading to his best friends' deaths, had nearly eaten him up, so enhanced it was by the Dementors' presence – it had taken him much longer to realize he wasn't the one to blame because of them. "I could just tell by his face. He's blaming himself for this."

"He shouldn't feel that way. Nothing that happened could have been his fault," Mia replied immediately. "If anything, he helped everyone but warning us ahead of time. Saved many lives by coming up with the Felix Felicis strategy."

"That's true, love, but it doesn't matter, as crappy as that sounds. It's survivor guilt: it doesn't have to make sense. He lived, Dumbledore didn't – that's enough for him to blame himself." And it didn't help that Harry had a natural tendency to blame himself for bad things, either they were his fault or not – it came with the burden of the prophecy he had on him and everything that had happened to him so far. Thus, it was inevitable that, after having to stand watching, frozen, as his headmaster was murdered, he'd be projecting scenarios where he could have done something, even the littlest thing, that would have saved him.

Mia knew he was right. She could remember now that it had happened back when Cedric Diggory had been killed too and everything in that memory made her feel so… powerless. "What do we say tomor… I mean, later today when we speak to him about what happened? Do you think he'll even be ready to talk already?" she asked

Sirius shrugged and answered both questions at once. "I have no idea. He's a tough kid, though – hopefully a long night of sleep will be enough for him to get his head back together." Or at least as close as it could get, he added in his mind.

"He needs to we'll be here to help with anything now that Dumbledore is gone," Mia whispered.

Her husband had to chuckle. "Love, the kid would have to be out of his nut to not know that already."

She sighed – yeah, she'd always made sure to show him that. "Did he say anything about what he and Dumbledore did outside the school? About the Horcrux?"

Sirius shook his head. "All he did was mentioning some potion Dumbledore took. That was what weakened him." He huffed. "Why would Dumbledore take some potion that would weaken him?"

"Maybe he was tricked… or didn't have a choice," Mia suggested, suddenly becoming worried. "You don't think Harry drank it too, do you?"

"He didn't say anything about it," her husband said, thoughtful. "Besides, if he's been weakened too, I doubt he'd have been able to chase Snape halfway through the castle the way he did… I think he's safe."

"Is he?" Mia whispered, sighing. She sat up on the sofa and reached further to rest against her husband's side – he was nothing but receptive, wrapping his arm around her and placing a reassuring kiss on the top of her head.

"He's as safe as he can be," Sirius said, trying to sound confident, even if just for her. "The school is being patrolled by half the Order and the Auror department. We'll figure out how the Death Eaters got in and we'll make sure it doesn't happen again. You'll see we will, even if I have to spend day and night working on it by myself."

Mia didn't respond. She just remained there, silent. Though part of her still believed that everything was going to change from then on, his reassuring words did their job settling her down. That massive weight in her chest, the one caused by the whirlwind of thoughts in her mind, just felt so much lighter felt after sharing it with Sirius – she should have known trying to avoid those thoughts would only make things worse. It was true that talking about what had happened didn't change the outcome of it – the fact was that, no matter by how many more deaths, injuries and captured they had topped the enemy, they had lost the battle that night along with their leader – but it made it easier to bear. "Thanks for listening," she whispered, looking up at her husband.

"Thanks for listening too," he replied, getting up and offering her his hand to help her up too. "Come on, let's try and get some sleep – you look exhausted and I'm not feeling all that fresh either. I suppose we weren't meant to get any rest without talking this through first. The universe seems to agree we're in this together, no matter what."

That made her sigh as she accepted his hand and got up, motioning towards her side of the bed as he walked to his own. "You know, I hated it that we had to go on separate ways in this fight despite what we promised each other last year," she told him as she slipped under the covers. "I couldn't stop wondering if you were okay."

Sirius nodded as he settled in bed too, lying on his side, his head propped up by his elbow. "I hated it too, believe me, though I have to admit I was glad to know you were at least somewhere safe where you wouldn't get hurt like you did last year. And speaking of which," he added, recalling something he'd completely forgotten in the midst of their talk, "I ran into Bella during the battle – it wasn't pretty for her."

Mia blinked at him a few times in confusion. "What do you mean? Was she captured too?"

He shook his head. "I wish. I can assure you, though, that she'll at least be feeling pretty crappy for a while after the flight I made her take. My money's on a big contusion in that messed up head of hers, among other equally uncomfortable injuries," he told her, feeling rather proud of himself for it. His face shifted to a confident look, then. "Nobodyhurts my wife and gets away with it. _Nobody._ It wasn't nearly enough compared to what she did to you but…"

He couldn't finish the sentence as she suddenly shifted to her side, closer to him, and interrupted his speech with a kiss. She wasn't sure why she'd done it but it didn't really matter – she guessed she was glad he'd made sure Bellatrix paid for what she'd done to her. She'd never forget that short moment when she'd wondered if her baby was dead because of her, which thankfully had been proven wrong.

He ended up rolling half on top of her and the kiss lasted for several seconds, sweet and fierce at the same time and, by the time it was finished, Sirius found it hard to even remember what he'd been talking about.

"Thank you," she whispered to him, looking up.

"You're welcome," he replied absently, a silly smile on his lips.

Only the streetlights illuminated the room as he'd turned off the lamp near the couch but it seemed to be enough for her to see as his hand reached down to touch her face tenderly while he struggled to balance himself on her so he wouldn't crush her. Soon, his touch became a caress and the caress became an invitation that was silently accepted. Before long, Sirius saw himself bringing his lips down closer to hers until they came together once again. It was amazing how they couldn't really bring themselves to care about what was going on with the world as their lips moved together. They were each other's escape – that was no news.

The kiss grew more passionate than before. Hungrier. And then it became much more than a kiss as their clothes started to disappear, giving way to each other's touch. They could just lose themselves in it, wishing that the passion wouldn't just make problems disappear from their minds but make them go away altogether. Regardless, together they could let go of it all, even if only temporarily. It was enough at the moment.

Much later, as they lay together on the bed, sleep finally came for both of them, allowing them to rest free of nightmares and worries this time, so deep was the exhaustion.

They couldn't even care that the rest of that day was bound to be hard in more ways than one…

**A/N2: Well, it wasn't half as fast-paced as the last one but, well, Sirius and Mia needed their time to deal with things together (I hadn't intended this to get so long but, well, sometimes scenes get a life of their own...). I hope you all liked it! Feedback is, as always, welcome. Review!**


	28. Before and After

**A/N: I had intended to post a 4000 and something word chapter last Sunday. I really had (****I even timed it and worked on my internship's report for a few days before getting to the chapter)****. Only, turns out, the chapter ended up becoming a 8000 and something word one... That said, here's a big one! **

The morning after the battle dawned grey and rainy like the weather itself was mourning Dumbledore's loss. The headlines of the Daily Prophet, among other publications in the Wizarding World that had even issued special numbers to cover the events of the previous night, announced it in large and bold font: '_HOGWARTS TURNED INTO BATTLEFIELD: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE KILLED IN ACTION'._

The words had been brutal and blunt – nothing less than reality was. When she had first read the headline, around eight, not more than an hour before, Mia had wondered how many people had nearly choked while practicing their daily morning routine of picking up the newspaper while taking breakfast… She had also wondered how many angry parents would be invading Hogwarts that day. Thinking back, Mia recognized that she couldn't really blame them, could she? She was pretty sure she and Sirius would have done the same if they didn't hold teaching positions in the school there that so easily allowed her to keep an eye on Harry and Izzy in a daily basis.

"Mama?" Mia suddenly snapped out of her thoughts as she heard her youngest son's voice calling for her.

She turned her eyes back to Alex, only to find him standing on his bed, staring at her with huge grey eyes. There was an annoyed, yet curious look on his little face as he wondered why his mother had stopped the activity of dressing him seconds before and suddenly become very pensive.

"Sorry, Baby, Mama was lost in thought," Mia told the little boy, trying to give him a smile, which came out rather faint. "Arms up," she instructed him.

Alex did so, allowing her to dress him in a dark blue short-sleeved t-shirt over the white undershirt he was wearing. Mia raked her fingers through his soft dark hair, afterwards, combing it back into place.

"Mama, you sad?" the little boy asked her in a little voice, with just a hint of concern on it – as much concern as a boy that wasn't two years and a half old yet could show.

Boy, he was observant, Mia noted. Sometimes little kids just had a way of seeing right through a person… sense their moods like a thermometer reading the temperature. She brushed her hand tenderly against his cheek and couldn't really deny it. "Just a little, honey," she admitted softly.

He gave her a tiny frown, then. "Why?" That seemed to be his favourite question lately, curious as he was about the world. Why did it rain? Why weren't Izzy and Harry home? Why did little Mary just make baby sounds instead of using words like everyone else?

Mia usually made an effort to explain but that time… that time she just couldn't bring herself to do it. She shook her head at him, then. "Nothing you need to worry about, my little prince," she told him, cupping his chin affectionately. Nothing he could understand at that tender age, thank Merlin, she told herself. Hopefully by the time he'd be able to understand, the world would be back the way it belonged – in peace. People wouldn't be killed left and right by a bunch of maniacs with a pureblood complex.

Alex looked at her with inquisitive eyes for a few moments before lifting his little arms again, though this time Mia knew he was asking to be picked up – he usually did that for such purpose. Mia sighed and smiled with a little more determination that time as she lifted him into her arms, allowing him to wrap his arms around her neck.

"Dun' be sad, Mama," he told her innocently, his head buried against the crook of her neck.

The little boy's words helped more than Mia would have thought. She held on to her son tightly, taking in his warmth and the clean smell of baby soap. It reminded her of another little boy she'd once upon a time held like that. Harry.

It was so easy back then… The only things bothering him all those years ago were occasional nightmares and mild injuries he'd get from playing with Izzy. All it took for her to help him was sitting him on her lap and holding him there until everything was okay again. Now, he was too grown for her to hide behind her skirts, so to speak. She heard herself sighing again. "Why can't you little boys just stay little forever?" she asked her son, not expecting any sort of logical answer.

"Foweva?" Alex asked in return, trying to grasp the notion of the word as he pulled away a little while Mia shifted her position to hold him on her hip.

"So Mama can always keep you away from bad people," she said, brushing his dark hair away from his forehead so she could kiss him there.

His curious eyes examined his mother for another moment. "Betta, Mama?" he asked her.

Mia nodded and gave him another smile even though the improvement in her mood hadn't been that great. "Yes, Mama's better. Thank you, Baby."

He little boy grinned, pleased with himself, and gave his mother's cheek a sloppy kiss that made her chuckle before she placed him back down on the bed to help him with his shoes.

As quickly as one would flip a page of a book, Alex's concern over his mother's mood seemed to have vanished from his toddler-aged mind and, seconds later, he was already asking where his father was as Mia tied his shoelaces. He ran as fast as his little legs could carry him out of the door, pulling his faithful stuffed dog by the tail behind him, just as soon as his feet hit the floor – Mia followed him to the hallway just to make sure he was heading straight to the nursery, where she told him Sirius was dressing Mary, and it didn't take more than the sound of her husband imitating the roar of some sort of wild animal followed by massive giggling from both Alex and Mary for her to know her son had reached his father safely.

She'd already made it back into the room and started folding her son's pyjamas by the time the room was filled with the sound of knocking on the already open door. Mia turned around to face the doorway and was surprised to find her mother standing there.

"Lulu? How long have you been back?" Mia asked, recalling that both her parents had been impossible to contact, as they'd been spending the weekend somewhere out of town and weren't supposed to make it back until the following morning. She had a feeling their early return meant they already knew about the battle and Dumbledore's demise.

"A few hours – I was in Hogwarts earlier. Just dropped by the apartment to grab a shower afterwards and came here. McGonagall has already started the repairs," she replied as she stepped further into her grandson's room, confirming Mia's suspicion that she'd already heard the news. "Gabe and I got the silent calling about the attack. We came back as quickly as we could but, obviously, that wasn't quick enough." She huffed, frustrated. "Bloody French blokes. Do you have any idea how much time we wasted with their stupid bureaucracy to get a damn last-minute international portkey? I was starting to think it would be faster if we just apparated to the north and swam to all the way through the English channel back to Britain."

"I'm pretty sure last-minute international portkeys take time everywhere, Lu, not just France," Mia pointed out mildly. "Besides, it's not like you being here for the battle would have changed much, Lu. It was trap – Dumbledore didn't stand a chance."

Lulu shook her head. "You don't know that. You know what they say about a tiny thing happening different in the past changing everything from there on." She let out a huffing sound. "I can't believe we missed it. Your father is all broody about it – says he should have known something like this was going to happen."

"What? Is he related to Trelawney now?" Mia asked sceptically, crossing her arms as she sat down on her son's bed.

Lulu shrugged, still standing. "You know how some aurors are. Always think that they should know everything like they're bloody seers. Never mind that Gabe's been retired for years…" She sighed. "Still, he's right in a way. Feels bad to know that the old man is gone and we couldn't do anything to help it."

Mia looked down, understanding the feeling. "If it serves you any consolation, I was there and I couldn't do a thing either."

"Yeah…" her mother mumbled, sighing. "You know, if it wasn't for Dumbledore, I might still be some loser who had never taken her NEWTs. One day, around the time when you were one year and something old, he just showed up in the doorway of the old Davis house – I was sure by that time that happened that he didn't even remember I'd been a student at Hogwarts who'd dropped out."

"You were wrong," Mia concluded easily.

"Plain wrong," Lulu confirmed. "I have no idea how he found out where I was living and I still wonder if he knew I was more than your nanny at that time. Anyway, Dumbledore just looked at me and said: 'Miss Graham, you'll be taking your NEWTs next June'. Just like that – no chance to refuse, which at the time I was tempted to do just because I felt like it. Then, he handed me a list of the contents I was supposed to study, a bunch of books from the school-library, wished me good luck and left. I think I stood there holding all that stuff for about ten minutes, trying to figure out if that had just happened."

Mia couldn't help laughing at the mental image. "That sounds like something Dumbledore would do."

"You can say that again. From that day until June of the next year, all your bedtime stories pretty much only consisted of me reciting out loud the contents of my History of Magic book while I studied – apparently you loved it. Until you were five, you'd cry your lungs out if I even tried to tell you any bed-time story that didn't consist of an authentic lecture on the Troll wars or something – it was a pain softening those up for a little kid to understand, you know? That's probably why you turned out to be such a History freak…"

"Wow, thanks, Lu. That's exactly what a person wants to hear her mother calling her: a history freak," Mia stated dryly.

Lulu rolled her eyes. "Oh, quit it. You know what I mean. No need to say I passed all those exams – though a few only barely." She sighed. "Anyway, Albus Dumbledore was just… something else."

"He really was," Mia had to agree.

"But, moving on," Lulu continued, "McGonagall mentioned you and Sirius were supposed to go to the school today in order to talk to Harry – he still hadn't come down for breakfast by the time I had to leave."

Mia nodded. "Ginny made him choke down a considerable dose of sleeping potion last night. He might still be asleep."

"I figured he might. Anyhow, when are you and Sirius heading to the school?"

"Well, we'd talked of heading there as soon we left the kids with someone. Who, however, we were still trying to figure out," she confessed.

"What am I? Chopped liver?" Lulu asked, trying to sound offended.

"Well, we didn't exactly _know_ you were back," Mia replied dryly.

"You do now," her mother said. "Problem solved. That's what I came here for, anyway. I figured Hogwarts could handle its repairs without me there while you and Sirius probably needed someone to relieve you a little from the massive weight on your backs. Go take care of your big kids, I'll keep an eye on the little ones, as usual."

Mia smiled at her mother – Lulu was always around to give her a hand when she needed. "I can't thank you enough, Lu."

"Mia, I'd much rather be here babysitting your kids than being bossed around by that old bat, Mad-Eye, at Hogwarts. At the rate he's going, I think you've just spared my foot from kicking the living hell out of his ugly arse," Lulu said unceremoniously.

Because she was so thankful, Mia restrained herself from pointing out that maybe the problem in that matter was more Lulu's temper than Mad-Eye's bossiness.

Ten minutes later, with Alex entertained doing some draws in the living room and Mary dozing in her portable bassinet, both under Lulu's watchful eye, Sirius and Mia were free to head to the kitchen's fireplace in order to catch the floo to Hogwarts. Yet not everything went according to planned when the latter stepped into the fireplace.

"Hogwarts," Mia shouted, releasing the handful of floo powder she'd been holding and waiting for the wave of non-hot fire to transport her to the destination she'd invoked. Nothing happened, though. She raised an eyebrow and saw her husband doing the same as he stood opposite her. "Did I do it wrong?" she asked.

"Not that I noticed," Sirius told her, equally confused. "Maybe you should just try it again."

She did so but the results were the same – for some annoying reason, the floo wasn't working.

"What the hell?" Sirius mumbled, approaching the fireplace too.

Confused, Mia stepped out of the structure and reached for the pot of powder to fumble with it a little. The colour was right, the texture was right… it looked like floo powder. "Kreacher," she said, turning to look at the house-elf, whose attention already seemed to be on the fireplace instead of the dishes that were washing themselves in the sink, "did you change this floo powder? Or did the Alex somehow get his hands on it?"

"It be powder masters use all week," Kreacher responded, apparently also surprised. "And Kreacher always keep powder away from young master Alex. Mistress's mother use floo only minutes ago."

"Weird," Sirius mumbled. If the floo was working one way for Lulu, it had to be working the other too, right?

"Perfect," Mia said sarcastically. "The floo just had to be broken today of all days when we need to get to Hogwarts…"

"It would be worse it if had been broken yesterday." After all, they wouldn't have been able to get into the school as fast as they had without it. "Guess we'll have to apparate to Hogsmeade instead like everyone else does."

Mia huffed in frustration and nodded. "Hopefully someone will be there to open the gates for us." She turned to Kreacher. "Try to find out what's wrong, would you?"

The house-elf nodded. "Kreacher find out and fix it for Mistress."

She thanked the house-elf and turned to her husband as both reached for their wands. "Right in front of the gates," Sirius said, indicating their meeting point just in case they ended up landing farther from each other than planned.

Mia nodded and braced herself for the uncomfortable sensation that followed: it was like being pulled very fast by some sort of invisible rope to her destination. By the time she landed, she felt rather dizzy and kept herself from opening her eyes at first until the feeling vanished, a few seconds later. When she felt something touching her arm, Mia looked up and found Sirius was already by her side.

It was only a fraction of second later that their brains registered how noisy and crowded the area was. It took them yet another fraction to note that, in fact, the noisy crowd seemed to be constituted of students' parents and was blocking the way to the gates and into the castle.

"Oh my…" Mia mumbled.

"Someone's got to be kidding me!" Sirius said out loud. "What is this? A riot? Is today 'let's get in Sirius and Mia's way' day?" Could it be some sort of new side-effect to the Felix Felicis he'd ingested in the previous day? A really annoying wave of bad luck?

"How are we getting through…" Mia pointed at the mob, a clueless expression on her face "…_that_?"

That was a good question. "I guess we'll have to push through the crowd," he said, as unpleasant as the thought sounded.

And as unpleasant as it sounded, it was even worse when done. People pushed and yelled, kicked and cursed, bumped and complained even when they explained they were teachers at the school as they passed. Later, Sirius would wonder if, out of all parents, only the coarsest and dumbest ones had landed in that wretched mob. All he knew was that, by the time he reached the front of the crowd and saw himself in facing the closed gates, he simply had no patience to put up with any more of that. So, when the little bald man on the other side – some ministry official accompanying the aurors stationed the gates, none of which he or Mia were acquainted with – lifted difficulties for them to get into the school, showing himself sceptic when they told him they were teachers, Sirius felt tempted to punch him through the gates, if that was possible.

"Oi, Smith! Quit bein' an idiot an' let 'em in," Hagrid's loud and gruff voice came from several yards away as he approached the gates. "Those're Harry Potter's godparents! An' they work here!"

Embarrassed, the short man asked an auror to open the gates just enough for the couple to pass and stiffly wished them a nice day, to which Sirius replied with a not-so-flattering comment. Outside, several people protested, asking why they weren't allowed to go in when Sirius and Mia just had. A nearby auror proceeded to inform the mob that the school wards were being resettled and that only authorized people could get in until that task was finished for security purposes, so they'd have to wait a little longer.

Relieved for _finally_ being within Hogwarts's territory, Sirius and Mia walked together towards Hagrid, who was blowing his nose on a table-cloth sized handkerchief. "Tha' little plunker Smith. 's berk-y as they come."

"Can't disagree with that," Sirius commented dryly, shooting a glare to the bloke at the gates. Truth was, he was more annoyed at their apparent lack of luck that morning than at the guy himself.

"Do you know what's wrong with our floo connection?" Mia asked. "It wasn't working."

Hagrid nodded. "Mad-Eye's been messin' with the wards and mornin'. Probably turned it off fer the time bein'. 't's been a mess ever since the Prophet came out. Parents owlin' like mad; campin' outside the gates… Reporters. Can' let 'em in until Mad-Eye's done with the wards. Security measures, he says."

"Outside of this, everything's calm, right?" Mia asked.

"Think so. McGonagall would've said somethin' if it wasn'," Hagrid told them.

"And Harry?" Sirius asked.

"Ran into him when I was comin' down. Was with Ginny, Ron, Hermione an' yer girl. Said they were headed to the kitchens fer breakfast. Too crowded in the Great Hall, it seemed," the half-giant informed them. "The lad looked good, considerin'. Tough one, tha' kid. Takes after his parents. Gonna meet him now, aren' yeh?"

"That's the plan," Sirius stated.

"Good. Grand fer the lad to have yeh two around. And Ginny. The girl's good fer him - spitfire like her brothers, she is. No nonsense with her," he stated. "Well, I should get goin'. McGonagall asked me to find a nice place in the grounds... to put Dumbledore."

"He's… They're burying here in the school?" Mia asked, surprised.

"Tomorrow. Man like tha' belongs in this school. It was his home. Taught here fer over ninety years," Hagrid declared, grief on his own voice.

Sirius was taken aback for a moment. "Ninety… just how old was he?"

That had Hagrid reaching for his enormous handkerchief again. "Would've been 116 next month. I'd already bought a bottle o' mead fer him an' everthin'." He was sobbing by the time he finished.

Sympathetic, Mia rested her hand on the half-giant's arm, which made hers look incredibly small in comparison, and gave it a supportive tug. "There, there, Hagrid. Dumbledore… he had a long and full life."

Hagrid nodded but kept on sobbing even as he walked away from them, muttering something about what a great man the former headmaster had been under his breath.

Mia looked helplessly at her husband as their friend walked away, feeling the grief starting to come back to her again. Sirius shook his head and surrounded her with his arm. "It's okay, love," he mumbled.

"Poor Hagrid," she whispered. "He's taking this so hard…"

"He is," Sirius agreed. "But you can't take this that hard too – at least not now right before we talk to Harry. You don't want him to see you like that."

She nodded and took a breath, firmly ordering herself to let go of it. Deep, slow breaths. _Don't think of it now_, Mia told herself as she walked with Sirius towards the castle's doors. "Yeah," she finally said by the time they were reaching the doors, "you're right. Harry shouldn't see me like this."

He nodded and kissed her forehead softly. "Come on," he said, guiding her to the door located behind the grand staircase that led to the kitchen's corridor. As they walked through the entrance hall, they glimpsed the interior of the Great hall and noted Hagrid was right – it was very crowded with students indeed.

They quickly made their way to the kitchens, walking along the dark hallway behind the stairs and through the large portrait of the bowl of fruit that conceded them passage after Sirius tickled the pear.

Inside, Harry was easy to spot, sitting at the only occupied table of the kitchen, along with Ron, Hermione, Ginny and Izzy, and certainly the only one with hair that messy. All five seemed to be talking in rather hushed tones, Harry absently poking his eggs with a fork as he did so. He looked much better than the previous night – it seemed the night of rest had indeed done its job as he didn't looked as tired or disoriented as before, though a haunted look still shadowed his eyes.

As they approached the table, Mia couldn't help noticing Ginny shoving her elbow into Harry's ribs and nodding at his plate, apparently urging him to eat its contents, which he didn't look so keen to do, choosing to nibble on a piece of bland toast instead. It was only when his godparents were less than four or five yards away that registered their presence, putting the toast down.

"Good morning," Mia greeted the group, who promptly replied with a series of mumbled 'good mornings' before she turned to Harry. "How are you feeling?" she asked him.

He shrugged. "Fine."

Mia didn't quite buy it but nodded. "Is it a good time for us to talk?"

Before he even could answer, the rest of the group, except Ron who was too worried about finishing the pile of bacon on his plate, was already standing up from their places at the table and getting ready to leave. It seemed to be a mutual agreement between all three girls, and probably Ron too, that Harry needed to talk to them.

"Well, I've got to… hum, return a book to the library," Hermione said, making herself an excuse to leave as she shot Ron a series of warning looks. "You should come with, Ron," she suggested, "it's a heavy book. I could use a hand with it…"

"But I'm still finishing…" he nodded down at his plate.

Ginny was the one who solved the problem, reaching for her wand and pointing it at the plate and banishing the bacon away. "Not anymore," she said as Ron gaped at her in horror.

"Well, come along!" Hermione urged him, pulling Ron by the arm and making him stand up, all but dragging him out of the kitchens behind her afterwards.

Ginny cleared her throat, then. "Well, I guess we should go find Luna," she suggested, motioning to walk away. "Haven't seen her since the battle last night."

Izzy nodded. "We probably should," she agreed, giving each of her parents a hug as she walked away. "I'll see you later?"

Sirius nodded. "We'll find you, Izzybel," he told her.

"You'd better eat those eggs," Ginny warned her boyfriend, eyes narrowed, one last time.

Exasperated, Harry grabbed a forkful of them and shoved them into his mouth even though he didn't really feel like eating them. "There," he said after swallowing them.

The redhead shot him a smile. "Good boy. Now keep doing that," she said before walking away with Izzy.

Seeing themselves alone with Harry, leaving out all the house-elves who seemed to be too occupied to listen to them, Sirius and Mia sat down on the seats previously occupied by Harry's friends, settling themselves face to face with him.

"That one takes over her mother in what comes to trying to shove food down your throat," Sirius commented.

Harry's face shifted to something close to a smile. "She gets protective when she's worried," he replied. "I wish she wouldn't have to."

"Even couples without the baggage you two have worry about each other, Harry," Mia told him. "It's part of loving someone."

He nodded wordlessly, not entirely convinced and absently took another bite of his eggs as if his girlfriend's voice demanded him to in his mind. "I heard about what happened to Wormtail," Harry mumbled, turning to Sirius. "He threw himself out of a window?"

His godfather nodded evenly, still feeling slightly bitter about the matter. "He did."

"Hum," Harry mumbled, detached. He'd imagined he's feel some sort of victorious feeling knowing the man who'd betrayed his parents to Voldemort was gone but instead he didn't. Wormtail was just dead and he didn't really feel sorry or glad – if anything, he just felt like he was one less bastard for him to worry about. After the previous day, Wormtail had been bumped down several places in his list of 'most hated', compared to Snape, who was right up there with Voldemort. "I never pictured him ending his own life," he heard himself saying. He'd always found Peter Pettigrew too much of a cowards to even consider he might choose to end his life not knowing what would happen to him beyond death.

"I don't think anybody did," Sirius told him. "He only did it because the other option sounded even worse to him, honestly. He was a selfish coward right up until the end."

Mia cleared her throat, then, calling their attention. "So, Harry… do you think you can walk us by what happened yesterday?" she asked her godson. "It's okay if you need more time," she was quick to assure him.

He shook his head. "No. I think I can do it now," he said, eating yet another bit of his food before pushing the plate away. "Ginny and I… we've already talked about it earlier this morning. Before McGonagall came by my dorm, that is."

"You've already talked to McGonagall?" Mia asked, surprised.

He nodded. "It was only for a few minutes. I left out everything related to the Horcruxes, if you're wondering," he told them. "If Dumbledore didn't tell her himself, it didn't seem right for me to do it unless I really had to… I mostly told her what Malfoy had said up in the Astronomy Tower."

"What he said?" Sirius asked.

Harry nodded again. "He couldn't help gloating to Dumbledore about what he'd done all year. According to what he said, Malfoy had kept Madam Rosmerta imperiused since September. She was the one who gave Katie Bell the cursed necklace and who spiked the mead that poisoned Ginny."

Mia gasped. "Oh my…"

"He also said how he got the Death eaters into the school last night: apparently, there's some sort of travelling cabinet in the Room of Requirement that was connected to another one in _Borgin & Burke's._ The one in the school was broken, so he spent all year trying to fix it until he got it right yesterday." Harry paused, then, taking a breath. "He was supposed to have been the one killing Dumbledore. That was the mission Voldemort gave him but he couldn't do it… so, Snape did."

His words were followed by several seconds of silence between all three of them – the only sound heard was the one of the house elves messing around with the cutlery at a distance. He could see the whole scene in his head in detail. Sometimes, he felt like he was watching something out of a Muggle telly.

At some point, Sirius cleared his throat. "Why don't you tell us the whole thing from the beginning, Harry?" he suggested.

His godson nodded. "Okay give me just…" He took a few seconds to put the thoughts together in his mind and decide where to start. "You know I had this detention with… with Snape but before I got there, Dumbledore sent a message asking for me to meet him in his office after it."

"For another one of your meetings," Mia said.

"That's what I thought," Harry told her before he proceeded to tell her about the scene he'd witnessed after the detention, during which Trelawney had been unceremoniously kicked out of the Room of Requirement by a celebrating individual that he'd immediately assumed to be Draco Malfoy, making him reach the conclusion that something bad could be on the way. "Trelawney was all freaked out… rambling. She said some things that didn't make sense at the time but now…"

"What things?" Mia asked him, concerned.

Harry gulped. "She mentioned something about seeing a lightening-struck tower in her future readings. That it was connected to some sort of disaster approaching. I think she meant…"

"The astronomy tower," Sirius finished for him. "What happened to Dumbledore up there."

His godson nodded sombrely. "And that wasn't all she said," he stated, feeling himself tensing. "At some point, she started talking about her first meeting with Dumbledore – her job interview. That was the night when she made the prophecy."

Mia's face went pale for a moment. "She told you more about the prophecy?"

Harry shook his head this time, his expression hardened. "No. But she told me who'd eavesdropped it and told Voldemort about it." He bit his lower lip for a moment, looking at his godparents' faces. They looked expectant, yet fearful at the same time as they waited for him to tell them. "It was Snape. It's always _him_, isn't it?"

The expectant looks became shocked ones. Severus Snape didn't cease to surprise them lately with his actions.

"That son of a bitch," Sirius hissed under his breath, covering his mouth with one hand as Mia remained speechless. He didn't even know what to think. How to feel. Snape had never been his friend. He'd never owed him everything unlike Wormtail had. There was no betrayal that time, just a world-class bastard screwing them over further than he already had… But one they had in common: their actions, Wormtail's and Snape's, had been what had sent Voldemort after Lily and James. Snape and his big mouth had been the ones to start it all: to make Voldemort constantly torment Harry until, as the prophecy said, one of them ceased to exist. Nothing could change that fact just as he couldn't think of anything that would take his blame away.

"I went to Dumbledore, then," Harry continued, his tone raising as he spoke. "He was there when the prophecy was made so he _had _to know! He had to know it was _Snape,_ so I asked him how on Earth he could have trusted him to teach here after he'd sent Voldemort after _my parents_!"

"Wha… what did he say?" Mia managed to ask through her shock. The same question echoed in her mind. How could it be? How could Dumbledore have trusted Snape so blindly knowing what he knew?

"He said Snape had made a _mistake._ That sending Voldemort after me and my parents was the biggest regret he had in life – as if it makes things any better. As if he'd even regret it!"

"Harry…" Mia started. He wasn't seeing the whole picture and maybe that was her fault. There were things she'd never told him about, not because she'd wanted to keep it for hi but because they had never seemed… relevant after all that had happened.

"… he hated my Dad. Everyone knew it…" he continued.

"Harry!" Mia repeated.

"… must've been a really good liar and an even better occlumens to fool Dumbledore like tha…"

"He used to be your mother's friend," Mia told him bluntly – there was no other way, was there?

The young boy stopped speaking and stared at her in shock. "What?" he asked, turning to Sirius, then, expecting him to say it wasn't true.

"It was a long time ago," Sirius mumbled in a detached tone, confirming the truth. "Way before Snape evolved from a creepy little bastard to a creepy little bastard who wore a Dark Mark on his left forearm."

"My mother was friends with _him. _Why haven't I heard this before?" Harry asked, disbelieving.

"Because not many people know about it," Mia told him. "It was over long before you were born, Harry, and for a long time, Lily didn't even want us to mention it around her. She chose to leave it in the past and we respected that. It broke her heart when he became what he became even though by then their friendship was over. They met before Hogwarts – their families lived near each other – and were good friends for the first years at Hogwarts. They became more distant from third year on, when he started mingling with the wrong Slytherin crowds, and then in out fifth year…"

"He called her a mudblood," Sirius finished for her, his tone filled with disgust.

All three remained quiet for a long moment, then. There was so many questions in Harry's mind. He could only voice one of them, probably far from the most relevant. "Why would he call her a mudblood if she was his friend?" The simple notion confused him – he just couldn't picture himself doing that to someone like Hermione for instance.

Sirius shook his head. "We can't tell you about the 'why' – that only him knows. The best we can tell you is the 'how'." He took a deep breath, then. "Look, you already know that your father and I… we liked to 'mess' with Snape. Well, that was what we were doing one day and Lily stepped in to defend him – apparently, he didn't like her fighting his battle, so he told her to go mind her own business with the not-so-pleasant term thrown in the middle. Maybe part of it was out fault. Probably. But that's just not something you call a friend, even you're messed up."

"And… she put an end to their friendship when he called her that," Harry concluded, trying to put the pieces together. He was still struggling with the notion of his mother being friends with _Snape _– for all he knew, they couldn't have been more different.

Mia nodded. "Him calling her a mudblood was the final straw for her after a long list of dark stuff he'd been doing with his new friends. Lily could never forgive him for that." She sighed and reached with her hand across the table for his own. "I'm not telling you this so you think more highly of Snape or feel sympathetic for him. I'm not saying that he was being sincere over regretting having told Voldemort about the prophecy. But, if anything, this may have been the reason why Dumbledore believed he regretted what he did and why he trusted him. Dumbledore was no fool but he always tried to see the best in people." That had been his Achilles heel, she thought, pulling her hand back… "Maybe he thought your mother's death had changed him."

Harry bit his lip further, looking down. It made sense what Mia said about Dumbledore – he'd always tried to see the best in anyone. His last talk with Malfoy, during which he'd offered the blond boy sanctuary only proved that. But if he even had any inclination to wonder whether Snape's regret was genuine or not, it vanished with the memory of him using the killing curse on the defenceless headmaster without a blink of an eye. He'd tricked everyone, his mother and Dumbledore included. "It doesn't change what he did," Harry said. "He started this whole thing when he told Voldemort about the prophecy. And now he's killed Dumbledore too and we're all doomed!"

"Harry! Don't say something like that!" Mia told him, horrified.

"It's the truth, isn't it?" Harry replied. "Dumbledore died before he could reach the point when he told me how a Horcrux was destroyed! If I don't know how to destroy them, what do I do?"

"Kid, just because he didn't teach you how to destroy them, doesn't mean we can't find out on our own," Sirius told him.

"How?"

"I dunno. We'll figure it out. Research, trial and error… I mean, we can start testing right now. Didn't you get a Horcrux last night when you and Dumbledore left?" his godfather asked him.

Harry stunned then both by shaking his head in denial. "It was a fake. The Horcrux was supposed to have been a locket that had belonged to Salazar Slytherin himself but someone switched it by another. We went through all that stuff for _nothing_. Dumbledore had to die for _nothing_."

"Harry…" Mia started.

"We went to a cave," he started before she could finish what she was going to say – he figure he ought to tell them the rest before they could start convincing him that he hadn't been at fault. "Voldemort had been there when he was a kid and Dumbledore thought that was where he'd keep one of his Horcruxes. Inside it, there were barriers that required… sacrifices."

Even though she cringed at the expression, Mia forced herself to remain quiet as Harry spoke, gripping her husband's hand instead. Sirius looked down at her and she could see he didn't look all that calm either.

"The first was blood," Harry continued. "One of us would have to give some blood for a barrier that was blocking the way to open. I offered to give mine but Dumbledore refused – he said my blood was more precious than his, so he gave his own. And then we were in this big chamber inside the cave. There was a dark lake with some sort of island in the middle – that was where the Horcrux was supposed to be – and a boat to take us there. When we got to the island, we saw a stone basin on a pedestal: it was filled with some sort of potion and we were pretty sure the locket would be at the bottom of it. The problem was that we couldn't get through the potion – some sort of force, kept us from touching it, let alone reach the locket. Dumbledore concluded it had to be drank so we could reach the bottom of the basin."

"So, that was the potion that you said had weakened Dumbledore," Sirius concluded, recalling Harry's ramblings from the previous night.

Harry nodded. "That was the potion. Dumbledore started to drink by his own hand. He managed three or four goblets of it before he started faltering. It made him see things. Bad things. Sometimes he sounded like a little kid – a terrified kid – other times he'd apologize to someone over and over again. He'd made me promise I'd make him drink the rest if something like that happened, so I made him…" he paused, closing his eyes and sighing. "Maybe if I'd drank the rest myself…"

"You would have both been weakened and defenceless," Mia told him – she could never repay Dumbledore for making the sacrifice for Harry. Maybe in another life… "You did what you were told and it was the right thing, Harry."

"You don't know, that! If we'd split the potion, he wouldn't have been as bad… I'm younger than him. Maybe I'd have taken it better than he did. He would have been able to be faster and defend himself in the astronomy tower."

"Kid, use your brains," Sirius intevened. "Voldemort had to know anyone would be too weak to drink the potion until the end. He had to know that if someone wanted to get their hands on the Horcrux, there would have to be a second person to make the first drink the potion. You actually think he didn't have any trick up his sleeve like the basin filling itself all over again with the full dose or something like that if the two decided to share a drink? You wouldn't be able to cheat him so easily, Harry."

Harry sighed, silently recognizing that was something that Voldemort was very capable of.

"So, what happened from there?" Mia asked him.

"I got the locket from the bottom," Harry told her. "I barely had time to see it before a few dozens of Inferi started to emerge from the lake." He couldn't help noticing the look that Mia gave him then, which clearly said something along the lines of '_you actually think you should have drank half that potion with an army of Inferi right around the corner?_'. He resumed narrating it, looking away from her – alright, maybe he hadn't thought _that _through.

Ahead, he told them about how Dumbledore, likely in a rush of adrenaline, had managed to set the Inferi on fire despite his weakened state and how Harry himself had all but dragged the headmaster out of the cave so he could apparate them both to Hogsmeade. How they had used Madam Rosmerta's broomsticks to reach Hogwarts as fast as they could when they'd spotted the Dark Mark hovering over the castle and, finally, how Dumbledore had pleaded for Harry to get Snape for him, only to petrify Harry under his invisibility cloak for his own protection before he could do so. In the end, it all culminated to the appearance of Malfoy, then the Carrows, who'd urged the younger Death eater to follow his mission and, finally, Snape.

"It was all for nothing in the end," Harry said. "The Horcrux was a fake."

"Harry, are you really sure?" Mia asked him. "I mean, can't you be confusing things? Maybe you remember the one in the pensieve memories differently…"

Harry shook his head. "It's a fake. There was a note inside it. Someone saying he or she had realized what the Horcrux really was and stolen it to have it destroyed so Voldemort would be mortal again. I… it said more but I can't remember the rest."

"Do you have any idea who may have written it?" Sirius asked him. Who would have been brave or suicidal enough to steal a Horcrux from Lord Snake-face?

Harry shook his head. "None. All I know was that it was signed with some initials. R.A.D or R.I.P. No, not R.I.P. – I'm sure it started with an R, though. Maybe R.A.B.?" In normal circumstances, he would have known each letter by heart. He wouldn't have rested until he knew which each of them meant. None of that was the case, though. He didn't care so much about the contents of the note since the fact that the Horcrux was a fake had pretty much taken over his mind when he'd landed eyes on it – the note had carelessly been thrown into his trunk along with the locket, yet the feeling of failure remained loose in his head. It had been a pointless adventure… that search for the Horcrux. A pointless sacrifice of Dumbledore's strength and a pointless end to the headmaster's life… He knew that, sooner or later, he'd have to put some effort into studying the note to track down the fate its writer had given to the real Horcrux and destroy it if the person in question hadn't already. But, honestly, he was in too much of a funk at the moment to care – too many dilemmas in his mind, some harder than others. Too many things to give him grief… Too much. Merlin, he just wished he could just… take a break. "I'm sorry," he apologized to his godparents. "I just…"

Mia stood up slightly, pulling the chair she'd been occupying closer to Harry's and sitting back. "It's okay, Harry," she told him softly, pulling him into a hug. She couldn't bring herself to push him any further than they'd already gone. She couldn't make it any harder on him. "You've been through a lot yesterday. You're bound to feel confused. Just take your time. You've said enough today."

He nodded against her shoulder and sighed, relieved. "Thank you." He thanked Merlin or whoever higher power that was listening too for letting his godmother understand what he needed. Didn't she always? he wondered.

When she pulled away, Mia rested her hand on his shoulder. "You know that nothing that happened was your fault. It isn't."

Harry didn't respond to her – he knew she wouldn't like what he had to say if he spoke.

"She's right kid," Sirius added as the boy's gaze turned to him. "You'll probably take a while to realize that – that's okay. But nothing you did could have changed what happened. Things happen the way they happen, no matter what guilt tells you. Believe – I know quite a few things about it."

"I… hum… okay," Harry mumbled awkwardly. Maybe part of him wanted to believe his words but the other refused to let go of the guilt…

"Well, what are you planning to do for the rest of the day?" Mia asked, not-so-subtly changing the subject.

He shrugged. "I don't know. Ginny and I had thought of helping with the repairs – I think Ron, Hermione and Izzy wanted too… to keep ourselves occupied with something useful. But then I heard McGonagall didn't want the students on the most damaged floors to avoid accidents…"

"Tell you what," Sirius said, "how about you go fetch the others and your godmother and I will talk McGonagall into giving you something not accident-prone to do?"

Harry took a moment to think and then nodded in agreement. "Sounds good, I guess."

"Great. We'll meet here in twenty minutes?"

Their godson checked his watch and agreed with the meeting time as he stood up from his chair, motioning towards the portrait-covered doorway.

Sirius waited until he was sure the boy was gone from the room before turning to his wife, looking at her inquisitively. "So, what did you think of him?"

Mia sighed, thoughtfully. "I think he's trying very hard to remain strong about everything that's happened; he really is," she said softly. "And he's managing, most of the time."

Sirius nodded. "Yeah. I could see that too. That's bound to be a difficult thing to pull off when his world's been shaken to its very foundations… he never had to consider fighting without Dumbledore to back him up before."

"Yes, that's hard on him. But we're still here. He'll manage," Mia said, more to convince herself than to anything else. "He has to. He always does."

"He will," Sirius assured her, covering her hand with his. He knew the kid would put himself back together soon enough. But he also knew that, by the time he did, things were about to change.

Though he didn't say it out loud, Sirius felt almost certain that, with Dumbledore out of the way, it was only a matter of time before Voldemort made a major move. And he feared that, from then on, nothing would ever be the same.

**A/N2: As I said, big one... quite a ride to write - thank God today was a national holiday here or I'd never have had time to edit it. I hope you liked the chapter - for those wondering, yes, R.A.B. will be covered later by the time Harry had put his thought back together. Worry not. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	29. Request

It hadn't occurred to Sirius just how many people would want to pay their last respects to Albus Dumbledore. It really hadn't. Somehow, whenever the thought of the funeral crossed his mind, he'd always pictured only Hogwarts's students and staff and the Order. Yet, all it took for Sirius to realize how wrong he'd been was looking out the window of his wife's office – shortly after arriving to the school through the recently re-connected floo –, which allowed him to see the hundreds of people huddling near the spot facing the lake where Dumbledore's body was to be buried. Never mind that the ceremony wasn't supposed to take place in less than an hour at least…

"… and I'm not even counting the ones that must be camping outside the gates by now," Sirius narrated to his wife while he looked out the window, shifting as he unsuccessfully tried to find some sort of angle that would allow him to spot the gates.

"We all know Dumbledore was always a very popular man, despite the latest criticisms," Mia mumbled absently behind him as she picked up from the floor what seemed to be a note that had been slipped under her door. As she opened it, Mia immediately recognized McGonagall's pragmatic handwriting.

_Mia,_

_There are a few things I needs to discuss with you and Sirius as soon as possible. Please come to find me as soon as you read this._

_Minerva McGonagall_

"What's that?" Sirius asked as he turned around saw the little note in her hands.

"A message from McGonagall," Mia said. "She wants us to meet her – says she needs to discuss something with us."

"Does she say where she is?"

Mia shook her head. "Probably in her office."

"Yeah, but which one? Her usual office or… you know, Dumbledore's old one."

That was a good question, Mia observed in thought. It still felt foreign thinking of the transfiguration teacher as the school's headmistress but, truth to be said, that was her role now. Dumbledore's office was hers. But something told mia she hadn't taken up that right yet, though… she'd seemed too devastated, too busy in the previous day to even care about… trivialities such as moving to a new office. Mia ended up shrugging. "We can just ask around," she suggested.

"Yeah, I guess," Sirius agreed, shrugging too. Sometimes he just wished he had his own copy of the marauder's map… it would save him so much time sometimes.

It seemed they were lucky that day, since, barely a minute after leaving Mia's office, they ran into the Head Girl, who was running an errand for McGonagall and confirmed that the headmistress was indeed in her old office and not in Dumbledore's.

When they reached the office, the door was open as the older woman busied herself attaching a little note to a school owl's leg before sending it flying out of the window. Though McGonagall didn't look as bad as she had in the previous day, when she had barely seemed like a shadow of herself – pale, reddish swollen eyes and oddly silent – the headmistress still looked rather down that morning with dark circles under her eyes, which revealed her sleeplessness.

Mia cleared her throat before she and Sirius stepped in. "Minerva, is this a good time?"

The teacher looked up at them, startled for a moment. "Oh, Mia, Sirius. I was just finishing what I was doing. Please, come in," she told them, sitting down as they stepped into the office with Sirius closing the door behind him. She gestured with her hand towards the chairs in front of her unusually disorganized desk – parchment cluttered all over it –, indicating for them to sit down too.

"We saw your note," Mia told her. "What is it you need to talk to us about so urgently?"

McGonagall sighed and, before uttering any word, reached for her wand and pointed it to the door. The sound of the lock being shut echoed in their ears at the same time the voices of a few students walking and talking outside ceased suddenly. Satisfied, she lowered her wand. "Two things, actually," the headmistress said, sighing. "I'm not sure if Harry has told you that I've already talked to him yesterday morning."

Sirius nodded. "He mentioned it," he stated.

"Then you may already know that Potter was rather… secretive concerning why he and Albus left the school in the evening of the battle," McGonagall said – judging by her tone, both Sirius and Mia cold tell that that fact annoyed her. "I have to ask… if you're aware of what they were doing, I would like to know about it."

That one caught them by surprise. Maybe they should have predicted that McGonagall might drill them for answers but, for some reason, they hadn't…

"Minerva…" Mia started, uncertainly. It seemed ironic that the secret that had bugged her so much for being kept from her, the Horcruxes, was now the one she had to refuse to reveal. "We can't… We can't tell you that."

"So, you know what they were doing," the other woman concluded.

Sirius had to nod. "We do. Harry told us"

"It might be important," McGonagall told them.

"It _is_ important," Mia confirmed. "And, believe me, it's not because we don't trust you that we can't tell you. It's just… it's safer this way. And it's something you and everyone else do better not knowing. We made a promise to Dumbledore and it's not the sort of promise that… expires after death."

The headmistress pursed her lips for a moment and sighed. "It's not just about what they had to do when they left, is it?"

Sirius shook his head at that. "Not even close. It's _a lot_ more complicated than you think."

There was a silent pause after his words, which was only broken by McGonagall's voice about thirty seconds later. "Is it dangerous?"

"Yes," Sirius confirmed. He couldn't even imagine how much himself…

McGonagall decided to make just one last plead before completely giving up on the matter. "Maybe if the Order knew, we could help with that," she said.

"If he thought the Order could help, Dumbledore would have told you about this himself," Mia told her. "I'm sorry, Minerva, but neither us nor Harry can tell you about this. The least people to know it, the better."

It seemed to McGonagall that she had no other choice but to trust them, as much as it bugged her. "Very well," she said stiffly. "Promise me at least that, if a time comes when you need my help in this matter, you will tell me about it." That was the most she could demand – she knew better than not to trust Dumbledore's judgement after so long knowing him...

This time, Sirius nodded. "I think we work with that," he said.

"So," Mia said, then, anxious to change the subject, "you said you had something else to talk about…"

McGonagall nodded, resigned. "Yes, yes. That other thing I mentioned is about the Order. I have a… not so easy request to make you, I'm afraid…"

"A request?" Sirius asked, curious.

The other woman nodded. "As you know, Albus was the secret-keeper of the Order's headquarters. But with his… death… well, the arrangement of secret-keepers changed. Dangerously."

"What do you mean?" Mia inquired, confused.

"I mean that now everyone who'd been told about the Order's headquarters became a secret-keeper," McGonagall explained.

"_Everyone_?" Mia asked in disbelief.

"Everyone," the other teacher confirmed.

"Snape included," Sirius concluded, receiving a sullen nod in return. "Damn it. Just when you think that creep can't screw us over further…"

McGonagall cleared her throat disapprovingly before she spoke. "As you can imagine with a… Death Eater as a secret keeper, meetings can no longer safely take place in Lily and James Potter's old house in London or any of the other locations we usually use for that purpose, such as the Shrieking Shack."

"So, where can we meet now?" Sirius asked. "Hogwarts?"

She shook her head. "That thought occurred to me but I had to refute it. Aurors are now constantly watching the gates and the borders… it would be impossible for the whole Order to get into the school without being spotted and raising too many suspicions… It's too much of a risk when we all know that there may be hidden You-Know-Who-sympathizers within the ministry…"

"So, where, then?"

"Well, Arthur and Molly have offered their shed, which seems like a fitting solution. Nonetheless, Alastor insists that we need to reinforce the Burrow's wards before risking meeting there and that's where we have a problem," McGonagall said, huffing. "The Order needs to meet _urgently_ – even today, if possible – to figure out what to do now that Dumbledore is… gone and that gives us no time to completely reformulate the Burrow's wards on top of everything we already have to do. We need to meet somewhere else and the only place that Alastor finds safe enough for us to meet in right now is… well, is your house."

There were a few moments of silence, during which Sirius and Mia simply stared at her. "Our house?" Sirius eventually asked uncertainty.

McGonagall nodded. "It was Alastor's idea, not mine and please don't feel pressured to go along with this. We only considered it because, well, your father made that house into a fortress back when he lived there and then Albus himself did his share in reinforcing the protection. After Hogwarts, Grimmauld Place may very well be one of the most well-protected places in the Wizarding World. It would just be for this one meeting…"

For a moment, Sirius and Mia glanced at each other and it didn't take them more than a second to figure out that one was just as hesitant about the matter as the other. Grimmauld Place was their home, the place where their kids lived and played – where little Alex and Mary were at the moment being watched by Andromeda Tonks, whose babysitting services had been offered by her daughter for that afternoon. They weren't sure if they were comfortable with a group of people meeting there to plot against You-Know-Who…

But then again, they knew it was a necessary thing… Losing Dumbledore and the attack to Hogwarts changed a lot of things – they needed to figure out what they had to do from then on, how to control the damage already done and that needed to happen soon, as McGonagall had said. It wasn't like they didn't _trust _the people on the Order to be in their home.

"What do you think?" Mia asked her husband at some point.

"I think… I think that if we want to organize ourselves to fight back, we can't make a huge issue out of this," Sirius decided, before turning to McGonagall. "I mean, as long as everyone is careful not to be followed and reveal the meeting is there to someone outside the Order…"

"Of course, of course," McGonagall said immediately, nodding. "We're considering only revealing the location of the meeting to most members a few minutes before it takes place as a precaution – we trust everyone, of course, but we can never be too careful."

Mia nodded slowly – well, at least the fact that they were taking so many precautions soothed her fears. "So… tonight. Meeting at our house," she mumbled flatly, looking at Sirius, who nodded in return.

"Tonight it is," he said.

McGonagall sighed. "We can't thank you two enough for agreeing with this in such a short notice," she said. "Hopefully, this will be a productive meeting. Merlin knows we have quite a number of matters to discuss."

"I imagine we do," Mia agreed absently.

"Well, I suppose this matter is solved, then, only a few dozens more for me to handle now…" the older teacher concluded, saying the last part under her breath, probably not even realizing she'd said it out loud. She huffed and grabbed a few of the rolls of parchment from her desk as if she'd just realized how messy it was, shoving them into her drawers, frustrated.

"Minerva, do you need some help?" Mia asked, realizing just how overworked the headmistress seemed. She could only imagine how many letters and crisis situations she'd answered that morning already – although keeping busy usually helped getting one's mind off things, maybe McGonagall was going a bit too far.

The other woman shook her head, more stubbornly than anything else. "No need. I'm just still getting used to the…" she hesitated while picking up a few more pieces of parchment, giving them a quick read before either shoving them into the drawer or putting them on a 'to do' pile, "_headmistress_ duties. And then there are the owls from parents and the… funeral too…" She said that last part in a slightly strangled tone, like she was fighting very hand to keep herself together at the moment, on top of all her old and new responsibilities – Minerva McGonagall might be known for being a tough woman but even she could only take so much… Her eyes suddenly feel on a little note resting on the desk that had been covered under all that mess. "Oh, for the name of Merlin…"

"What is it?" Sirius asked.

"Madame Maxine!" McGonagall said, standing up with a jump and causing the 'to do' pile to fall on the floor, creating yet another mess, which she really didn't seem to care about. "Oh, I completely forgot about her! She should be arriving any minute for the funeral and I forgot to warn Alastor… make sure her carriage can pass through the school wards… It will be a disaster if she can't…"

Mia stood up too and got on McGonagall's way before she could speed out of the room. "Why don't you let me handle that, Minerva?" she suggested softly. "I'll find Moody and pass on the message for you, and then I won't mind accompanying Madame Maxine to the funeral site. Maybe you need to… delegate a little more."

McGonagall hesitated for a moment but sighed a few seconds later, realizing she'd probably sounded like a madwoman only seconds before, and nodded. "I suppose you're right. Thank you, Mia."

"No need for that," Mia replied before turning to Sirius. "I'll meet you later at the funeral, okay?" The look she gave him after that, together with a soft nod towards McGonagall, was clearly a request for him to stay with the headmistress for a few more minutes just to make sure she wouldn't flip or something.

"Sounds good to me," he told his wife just as she used her wand to unlock the door and remove the silencing charms McGonagall had placed on it, before walking out.

Just as Mia closed the door behind her, awkwardness filled the room. So, he was supposed to stay there, making sure McGonagall wouldn't throw a barking fit, which sounded like a ridiculous thought on itself for him… but what was he supposed to tell her? McGonagall wasn't just the type of person one talked about the weather with or any other small-talk-related topic… He was too used to only sit in that office when he was being lectured to oblivion.

"Sirius, you don't have to stay here," McGonagall said at some point as if she could read his mind, sounding much more composed than before. "I'm fairly sure I am not about to have a mental breakdown as Mia seems to believe. Though, I have to agree with her about delegating." The older woman stated, sighing. "I believe that in a few weeks you and Mia will have to be back in this office to discuss which one of you will take over the position of Head to the Gryffindor house."

Sirius looked surprised. "Really?"

McGonagall nodded. "I'm afraid with these new… headmistress responsibilities I'll have to give that up. And since you and Mia are the only members of the school staff that came from Gryffindor other than me…"

"No, I wasn't asking about that. You're actually considering _me _as well as Mia to be the Head of Gryffindor? I was under the impression my… not-so-squeaky-clean record at this school sort of pulled me out of the pool of choices."

"Well, I'll admit that in terms of… behaviour, Mia would be my obvious choice. Not to mention that you have some very… lax criteria to give out detentions, which we would certainly have to work on. But, out of the two of you, Mia has a much busier class schedule than yours, which would give you more time to deal with the position," McGonagall explained before taking a breath. "Truth is, Sirius, that you have grown to become a much more respectable person than, I confess, I would have expected, considering your… 'rabid troublemaker' years. Merlin knows there are a handful of Gryffindors who need to do the same."

Sirius's lips curved into a smile at his old teacher's words. "Did I mishear you or you're actually wishing that some kids would follow my example, _Professor_? Can I get that in writing? Nobody will ever believe me when I tell them if I don't bring proof."

The headmistress's eyes narrowed as she gave him a stern look. "Wipe that smile of your face, Black, and quit gloating."

For some reason, her tone still freaked him out the way it did back when he was the so-called 'rabid troublemaker', so he really couldn't help obeying her and remaining quiet.

The older teacher sighed – she'd always had a soft spot for troublemakers even though she had always made sure that wouldn't make her go soft on them. "You turned out well, Sirius," she ended up offering. "That's something you should be proud of. _Without_ gloating."

Sirius grinned again. "Well, since we're in a complimenting mood, I should point out that you were always my favourite teacher… after Binns, I mean. James and I could never play exploding snap in your classes the way we could play in his."

McGonagall shook her head disapprovingly. "You had some nerve, Black. Now, get out of my office – I have work to do."

He did as she said, standing up and chuckling on his way out. Yet, his good mood disappeared as soon as he opened the office's door to step out and had to groan at the sight opposite him. Rita bloody Skeeter apparently getting ready to knock. Why hadn't he left a minute before?

"Well, well, Mr. Sirius Black. It's been too long," the reporter said, shooting him a fake smile as her hand rubbed the lapel of her own deep-purple suit.

"Really? Then why do I feel just the opposite?" Sirius replied.

Her smile widened, as she reached for her dreadful crocodile-skin purse, pulling out a note-book and a hot-pink quick-quotes quill, which was apparently replacing her previous acid-green one, which Mia had snapped a couple of years before. "How about a quick one-on-one? How's young Harry? I hear he's had a sort of mental breakdown over the death of poor Dumbledore. Do you have any comments on that? Is it true you and your lovely wife are considering committing him to St. Mungo's?"

Sirius narrowed his eyes at her. "Skeeter, the only person who's going to have to be committed to St. Mungo's is you if you think I'm going to comment any of that sh…"

"Sirius!" McGonagall's voice came warningly from behind him. He turned around and saw the headmistress glaring at him as she approached. "There are students in this hallway!"

It was only then that he recalled that fact. With a quick glance around as he stepped away from the doorway, Sirius noticed a bunch of giggling third-year Ravenclaws and a few seventh years unsuccessfully pretending that they weren't trying to listen to the conversation. As McGonagall sent all of them away with one single look, he made a mental note to try and control his language from then on, even if the most annoying reporter that there was record of in his mind was standing right opposite him.

"Rita," McGonagall started, standing just outside her office with a not-so-pleased look on her face – this time, not directed to Sirius but instead the reporter in question, "I don't recall allowing your presence here in the school today."

"Oh, well, you cleared the presence of one reporter for the Daily Prophet," Rita said, smiling as she reached for the media pass she was wearing on the breast pocket of her suit. "As it happens, I work for the Daily Prophet and was sent to cover poor Dumbledore's funeral."

"Really?" Sirius asked, doubtfully. "Because I recall hearing you'd taken an extended leave of absence due to some… personal _bug_ issues." When Rita smiled, daringly showing him her perfect white teeth and apparently not caring one bit about his implied threat, Sirius decided he'd had enough. Why not be blunt? "You know, with you being an unregistered beetle animagus so you can eavesdrop on people and write sketchy articles about them."

McGonagall's face was filled with outrage. "I beg your pardon?" she all but yelled, looking between him and Rita. "An unregistered animagus… using transfiguration for such _unethical _purposes?"

"Why, but that's where Sirius here is wrong," Rita said, awfully calm. "I'll admit that I am indeed an animagus and can take the form of a beetle at will but I would _never _use that fact to spy on people." Judging from the tone she was using, it didn't seem like she was even a bit interested in sounding believable to him or to McGonagall – she knew well enough neither had any love or respect for her, so why try? "And as for being unregistered, as it happens, I filled the paperwork for registration _years_ ago but it appears it… got lost. Those papers weren't found until last week when a very helpful clerk at the ministry just happened to find them misplaced in this old achieve. Can you believe it?"

"Not for a second," Sirius replied dryly.

Rita ignored him, though. "Now, thankfully, everything was officialised and I am no longer at fault to the ministry. I mean, not that it was _my_ fault when I was… Seemed only fitting to go back to my regular work now that I have _nothing to lose_."

She might as well have made a victory dance and sang '_You can't blackmail me anymore,' _in a childish tone, Sirius thought as he gritted his teeth. "I can only imagine how much you paid to put little fairytale in motion," he said through his teeth.

"Who needs money when there are clerks in the ministry so needy for some… _loving_?" she asked casually under her breath.

Sirius shook his head slowly. "Wow, Rita, that's a whole new level of _dirty_ for you."

McGonagall cleared her throat before she spoke. "Now that we are sadly enlightened about Rita's return to work," she started, turning to the reporter in question, "I'd like to know what you were doing right outside my office. I hope it wasn't eavesdropping."

Rita smiled unpleasantly, snapped her fingers, casing the hot-pink quill to ready itself to start quoting. "Well, Minerva…"

"It's _Professor McGonagall_ for you," the teacher said coldly, "Minerva is only for friends and colleagues."

_Go, McGonagall, _Sirius observed mentally, grinning daringly at Rita, who seemed to be shooting arrows with her eyes.

"Well, _Professor McGonagall_," Rita corrected herself, clearly displeased, "I was hoping for a statement from you, concerning what happened in this school the day before yesterday and Dumbledore's fate at the hands of Severus Snape. If you could give me a minute in your office with you…"

"There will be no need for that," McGonagall said quickly. "Here's my statement: The attack to Hogwarts was unexpected and unfortunate, yet, thanks to quick interference of several aurors and other individuals, the consequences were minimized. We guarantee the parents of our students that we are taking all measures we find necessary to ensure their safety. As for Professor Dumbledore, his death was a great loss to the Wizarding World and he will be mourned and remembered by all of us here at Hogwarts, starting today with his funeral. I have no comment about Snape or anything else. And you'd better quote me word by word, Rita, because if you don't, I may have a certain talk with our minister about your animagus registration. You'd be surprised at how interested Amelia Bones can be about small matters like this one…" And with that, McGonagall took one step back and slammed the door on Rita's face.

Still grinning, Sirius turned to the reporter one last time. "Isn't it great when you're treated _just _the way you deserve?" And with that, he walked away. As tempted as he felt to turn around and see just how pissed of Rita looked – and boy, she had to be royally pissed –, he stopped himself in time. One could only poke a wild animal like Rita so much without getting mauled…

* * *

Around one hour later, most of the crowd that had been attending Albus Dumbledore's funeral was already dispersing.

It had been a tragically beautiful ceremony: the weather seemed to have been mocking them, forming the most beautiful near-summer day, contrasting with the previous one; the merpeople sang from the lake in some unintelligible, yet enthralling language; hundreds wept for the fallen headmaster, from the bass-player of the Weird Sisters (who Tonks, likely among the top 10 fans of the band, didn't even have the mind to acknowledge, clinging to her husband through the whole ceremony instead) to Amelia Bones, the Magic of Magic herself; and finally, near the end, Elphias Doge, someone Sirius and Mia saw from time to time in Order meetings and who was, apparently, a friend of Dumbledore that knew him since his school days, said the most heartfelt eulogy they had ever heard. Afterwards, all there was left of the headmaster was the white marble tomb covering his eternal place of rest.

A few groups of people started to form, then, as everyone walked away from the tomb and Sirius and Mia ended up seeing themselves being approached again by McGonagall and a limping, grumpy (as always) Mad-Eye, who apparently wanted to discuss that night's Order meeting with them.

"You two saved us a lot of trouble by allowing us to meet at your place," Mad-Eye told them. "I suppose I should thank you for that or something."

"Yeah, or something," Sirius mumbled. "Just as long as you don't make a party out of it… Remember we've got impressionable kids under the age of three at home."

The other man grumbled something under his breath about trying to keep that in mind in response. "Anyway, I wanted to know if it's okay for me to drop by your place a little earlier to take a look at your wards, though," the former auror told them.

"Why? Is there something wrong with them?" Mia asked, alarmed, turning to McGonagall Hadn't she just told them less than one hour before that those wards made Grimmauld Place one of the safest places in the Wizarding World?

"How am I supposed to know that without checking?" Mad-Eye replied grumpily.

"Alastor!" McGonagall scolded the man. "I think that what Mia wants to know about is what makes you think the wards need checking at all." Judging by her tone, she didn't really know it herself.

The other man shrugged, turning back to the couple. "Look, odds are that they're fine but with Dumbledore gone, I need to make sure the share of protection he created for the house is still standing. You know some spells vanish after its caster's death – this sort of protection charms usually last but we need to be constantly vigilant." He seemed ready to extend his words into a full lecture about constant vigilance – as if they actually needed another one… – when suddenly he straightened himself up for someone behind them and gave whoever it was a respectful nod – or as respectful as he could manage. "Minister."

Sirius and Mia turned around at the same time to find Amelia Bones standing there on her own, apparently having ordered the aurors who usually guarded her personally to stand back, out of earshot. "Alastor, Minerva," she acknowledged the older two, "and Mr. and Mrs. Black. It's good to see you again. I wish we could have met under less tragic circumstances."

Mia nodded. "It goes both ways."

"Is there something we can help you with, Madam Bones?" McGonagall asked her.

The Minister of Magic nodded. "Actually, there is. I would like to join your… organization."

Sirius and Mia raised their eyebrows – they were fairly sure that the organization she was referring to was none other than the one that would be meeting in their home in a few hours.

"I beg your pardon?" the headmistress asked, stunned.

"The Order of the Phoenix," Bones stated in a casual tone. "Minerva, I am _no_ Cornelius Fudge. I may spend my days sitting at a desk in the ministry filling paperwork but I keep my eyes open to what is happening around me. I know Dumbledore re-instated the Order over a year ago and I know you were the ones behind saving my life last year back when Rufus Scrimgeour was killed. My late husband took part in the first Order and, now, I want to join too. I'd been meaning to approach Dumbledore himself or Kingsley Shacklebolt for a long time, since I thought they would be the most receptive to the idea of me joining as they've known me the longest. For obvious reasons, Dumbledore is out of question now and Kingsley is still recovering from the injuries he sustained in the battle. I don't think there's time to waste now."

Mad-Eye just stared at her for a moment. "Why that's just… you're the _Minister_. We can't have the Minister in the Order!"

"And why not? Is that a rule?" the woman countered. "Shall I remind you that, as Minister, I have access to resources nobody else does? Resources I am very much willing to share with all of you?"

"It's too risky for you," he countered. "Probably even considered illegal by some law."

"As a matter of fact, it isn't. I checked. I want to do my fair share at protecting my people and just sitting behind a desk certainly won't do for me!"

The argument continued between Mad-Eye, McGonagall and Bones for several more minutes with Sirius and Mia acting as mere viewers through the whole thing until McGonagall decided to move that discussion to her own office as it was getting too loud and they found it fitting to stay behind.

"Bones is winning that squabble, anyway," Sirius pointed out as they watched the trio walk towards the castle, following by Bone's pair of aurors. "As if Mad-Eye could ever out-argument her – it's no coincidence she was the youngest person to even make Head of the Law Enforcement department, not to mention Minister. Either Moody likes it or not, she'll be joining the Order today."

Mia noted. "I'm fairly sure this is the first time since the establishment of the Ministry of Magic that a Minister has showed herself willing to risk her neck in the front lines of the battle," she stated.

"Yeah, well, that's because most politicians are major woosses," Sirius pointed with a huff, looking around to see who was nearby. Several yards away, he spotted Harry alone with Ginny standing together under a somewhat isolated tree, talking with serious looks on their faces, like they were plotting something or just having some sort of heavy heart-to-heart. "And what are those two up too?"

"No idea," Mia responded, raising an eyebrow. They looked altogether odd: Ginny's eyes were fixed on the floor as Harry spoke to her about something at the same time he glanced at the groups of students near them and then at them, looking away just as he saw himself being observed.

Sirius and Mia dared themselves to approach the couple but didn't get the chance to get very close to them, standing on a path just close enough to be able to see their lips move at a distance but not enough to hear them, before something unexpected happened. First, Sirius could swear he saw a flicker of movement on Ginny's mouth as she looked up at Harry that could have either been a beginning of a smile or a sneer. And then, she yelled. Loudly.

"_You what?_" the redhead shouted at their godson.

He said something in return and, though his tone was much lower and impossible to understand, they got the feeling that he was trying to calm her down. It didn't work.

"_You want WHAT?"_ Ginny yelled again, her tone so murderous that it caught the attention of everyone in a hundred-yard radius.

Harry seemed to be about to speak again when Ginny made yet another move, this one with her hand. She slapped him. _Hard_. He looked genuinely surprised by that, even more so than by the yelling, rubbing his cheek as he watched her speeding away like a red-topped hurricane.

In a rushed pace, Ginny reached the path where Sirius and Mia were standing, walking in their direction, headed to the castle.

"Ginny, what happened?" Mia asked her when she passed right by them.

The redhead looked at them, tears apparently of anger running down her cheeks. "Your godson is a bloody _jerk_. That's what happened!" she spat as she sped away, practically with smoke coming out of her ears.

That wasn't good, Sirius thought. That wasn't good at all.

**A/N: Another chapter - not 8k word-sized, though... I hope you enjoyed it. Senior year of college is catching up with me - didn't think it would be this different from the other years... Anyway, at least I can still find time to write (thank god!), though not as much as I'd wish. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	30. Illusory Confinement

**A/N: So, I sort of merged two chapters into a really big one because next week I'll have a two-day field trip and it may cause yet another delay... Enjoy that 8000+ words!**

"Kid, _what_ did you do?" Sirius asked as Harry walked towards them, face-down and with his hand shoved into his pockets.

Now that the red-headed hurricane that was Ginny was out of sight, everyone's staring had shifted to Harry's moving form. There were groups of girls whispering among each other, a few Slytherins snickering at Harry's public humiliation and several people who'd just come for the funeral simply looking curious. And then, there were Remus and Tonks, who stood witnessing the scene from several yards away, looking just as confused at the others.

"Can't talk about it here," Harry said as he reached them. "There are too many people around."

His godfather narrowed his eyes – he had a feeling he knew exacty what had just happened. "You _didn't_. Just tell me you didn't do what I think you did, Harry," Sirius said, not receiving an answer in return. "You dumped her, didn't you?"

Harry looked down, his expression awkward. He couldn't bring himself to respond to them because… well, because it was too complicated to explain truthfully with so many people around. He really didn't want to have to lie to them just to avoid it. He should have thought they'd ask.

He didn't need to lie, though, as his god-parents took his refusal to speak as an admission of guilt.

"Merlin, Harry, _why_ would you do that?" Mia asked him, dumbfounded – what was going on in that boy's head? "You and Ginny are so… you and Ginny. Is this because of what happened to Dumbledore? Some sort of … self-punishing act?" She took a deep breath – she vaguely remembered hearing about those in some Muggle TV show that aired on their telly back when she'd been stuck at home with a newborn Mary. "Oh, Merlin, it's worse than I thought."

"What? No, it's not some _self-punishing_ thing," Harry said, furrowing his brow like she'd just said the weirdest thing he'd ever heard. "Look, it's just… complicated. Can we _please_ go talk somewhere else? People are staring."

"Bet your arse they're staring," Sirius said. "You weren't on this side watching the show you and Ginny put up." He sighed, mentally recognizing that he was indeed very curious about what Harry had to say and started considering where they should move that conversation to. His and Mia's offices were in the castle and he really didn't feel like going all that way – with all the people cluttering the school, it ought to take about ten or fifteen minutes to get there, between greetings and people pulling them aside to talk about completely pointless matters. Where else could they go and get some privacy? Maybe the opposite side of the lake? No, that was too open. Maybe… Suddenly, an idea occurred to him and he found it just perfect. "Follow me," he told Mia and Harry, motioning to walk along the path they were standing on, exactly on the opposite direction of the castle.

"Sirius, where are we going?" Mia inquired.

"You'll see in just a moment, love."

And as promised, just a couple of minutes later, they did see where Sirius was taking them: The Quidditch Pitch.

Harry stopped walking and raised his eyebrows. "Er… I actually meant we should talk somewhere _private_, Sirius," he pointed out.

Sirius nodded and removed a bunch of keys from his pocket. "Just trust me, kid."

They ended up not actually entering the stadium but heading to a door on the side of it, which Sirius opened with one of his keys – it was a supply closet.

"Private enough for you?" he asked Harry. As Quidditch instructor and referee, he had access to pretty much everywhere in that pitch, including the places that were off limits to the students. He could say that was his domain.

Harry shrugged before stepping in. "I guess."

The closet wasn't very big and its ceiling was crooked, making the height of the room more and more reduced until it reached barely four feet when the ceiling met the wall opposite the door. Only a lamp on the ceiling illuminated it after Sirius turned it on and locked the door again, casting the usually silencing charm to avoid eavesdroppers.

"Well?" he asked Harry, sitting down on sturdy chest piled on top of another by the door. Mia also managed to find a pile of cardboard boxes to sit on, as did Harry. "You can start explaining what happened between you and Ginny."

Harry hesitated. "It's a long story."

"Start from the beginning, then," Mia suggested.

Their godson sighed. "Alright but just… don't interrupt me until I'm done telling you."

* * *

**The night before **

Illuminated only by the small light-spot at the end of her wand and making as little noise as she could, Ginny made her way down the girl's staircase headed to the Gryffindor Common Room. Harry had asked her, shortly before she'd headed to bed little more than an hour before, to meet him down there at midnight, when they could talk without interruptions and being overheard as everyone else would be in bed.

As she walked down, step by step to go unnoticed, Ginny wondered what that was about. They'd been alone plenty of times that day, though he certainly had looked lost in thought most of the time – no wonder, since little more than twenty-four hours before he'd watched his headmaster and mentor be murdered in front of him. It hurt her that she couldn't help him more with that…

When she reached the last step and walked into the common-room, the fireplace was lit, illuminating the room with tones of orange. And oddly, she noted, the room also seemed to be empty. Had Harry forgotten about the meeting? He'd better not or she'd _kill _him for having made her spend a full hour lying in bed, bored and fighting sleep for nothing. "Er… Harry?" she called in a hopeful whisper.

"Here," she heard him respond before he stood up, revealing he'd been sitting on the floor in front of the couch.

She sighed. "I was starting to think you'd stood me up."

He shook his head. "Of course not. You'd go upstairs to my dorm-room and drag me down here if I had, anyway."

"You got that one, right," she said, approaching his spot behind the couch. She might have kissed him, even if only as a soft greet, but something in that solemn look on his face told her that might not be the moment. "I take it you asking me to come down here wasn't code for 'let's take a shot at snogging on the Common room sofa'."

"No, not really," he said, motioning to sit back down on the floor as she did the same. "I actually meant to talk."

"About what?" Ginny asked – she felt the tickle of nerves in the back of her throat. He seemed too serious for it to be good.

"Stuff," Harry responded, her arms crossed over his bent knees. "Decisions and… things."

She raised her eyebrows. "Could you be a bit vaguer?" she asked sarcastically. "You're spoiling the whole talk with so many details." She paused for a moment and noted she might have been a bit too harsh. "Sorry. I'm a little edgy. What's going on, Harry?"

"I've been thinking a lot today," he told her. "About many things – too many to even start telling you about all of them unless you have a week spare." He sighed, looking down at his knees.

"And?" Ginny asked, urging him to speak. "Any conclusions?"

He spoke in a thoughtful and detached tone – entirely too _normal_ for the matter in question. It seemed like he was just stating a regular fact. "We shouldn't be together, Gin."

Ginny felt her blood freeze inside her veins and stared at Harry. "What?" she asked, her tone with a hint of shock and disbelief. "You're joking."

"Ginny…"

"No," she said, lifting her hand to interrupt him – she was trying very hard to remain cool even though her mind was racing. He wanted them to break up? Just like that? And he was saying it in that blasted casual tone that made it sound like he was asking her to fetch him a sandwich instead of asking her to end their relationship? "Just… what sort of… completely demented train of logic led you to that conclusion?" She _needed_ to know.

Harry sighed. "It's not _demented_, Gin. Voldemort uses people his enemies are close to. He's already used you as bait once in your first year, and that was just because you were my best friend's sister. Think how much danger you'll be in as my girlfriend. He'll try and get to me through you and Merlin knows I'd do anything, not matter how… stupidly risky it was to make sure you were safe."

She closed her eyes and huffed in frustration. "I _knew_ it was for some stupid noble reason," she mumbled under her breath. "Just being a _Weasley _puts me in danger – we're blood-traitors and all that nonsense, remember? Almost as bad as Muggle-borns for them."

"You're not actually trying to compare the amount of danger of being a Weasley to the amount danger of being Harry Potter's girlfriend, Ginny, are you?" he asked her in disbelief.

"So, what if I am?" she defied. "It's still danger, isn't it? Every month, _he _makes people vanish – people who don't even know you and whose odds of being targets are minimal. That should show you that, in this war, the amount of danger one's in doesn't really apply to much more than numbers. What if I don't care about those numbers?"

"_I _care," Harry replied. "How do you think I'd feel if tomorrow I was going to your funeral instead of Dumbledore's? Because Voldemort had killed you to get to me?"

"So that's what you asked me here for?" she asked, looking down at her crossed legs, since she couldn't really face him at the moment. "To _end things_?"

There was a long moment of silence and at some point, Ginny dared herself to look up at him just to try and guess what was on his mind. He seemed guilty and ashamed as his eyes remained on the fire. "No," he said at some point. "I don't want to end things."

Ginny let out a frustrated breath. "Then why on Earth did you just say all that crap about why we shouldn't be together?" she asked, her voice filled with disbelief. What on earth was going on inside his head? How she wished she knew how to practice Legilimancy… "Merlin, Harry, are you okay?" she asked, noting how troubled he looked.

"I'm fine," he replied, looking up at her to see an unconvinced look covering her face. "I really am."

"Then tell me what this is all about, for Merlin's sake," she requested, tentatively resting a hand on his shoulder.

He sighed and nodded. "Okay. I said we shouldn't be together for… for all those reasons I've just told you."

"Which are rubbish, as _I _pointed out," Ginny corrected him flatly.

"Maybe you have a point but you can't deny that so do I," he offered diplomatically. "But the thing is… no matter how much a part of me thinks that we shouldn't keep this up… I'm too selfish to let you go. I spent the whole day convincing myself I should but the truth is that _I don't want us to not be together_. The past year has been… hell between all the messes Voldemort keeps causing. But it has also been one of the best ones of my life because of what we have together." He huffed before turning to Ginny. "Does that make any sense or am I just going mad?"

For the first time since she'd sat there, Ginny managed to give him a shadow of a smile as her hand descended to his own. "You're not mad – at least not more than usual, as far as I'm concerned. And I understand what you meant by what you said – it's been a bittersweet year for me too." She sighed. "So, what did you ask me down here to if it's not to break up, then?"

He hesitated. "Er… that's the complicated part."

Ginny narrowed her eyes, foreseeing complications. "Harry…"

"Just listen, okay," Harry requested. "Just let me say what I have to say and then we can talk… or you can yell, depending on how you take it. Please?"

Her eyes remained narrowed to thin slits. "Get to the point, Potter."

"Alright," Harry said. "We've already established that I don't want us… I don't want us to break up. Yet that doesn't change the fact that you openly being my girlfriend puts you in major danger, Ginny. If we weren't together anymore, though…"

Ginny huffed in frustration. "For Merlin's sake, Harry, have you hit your head or something? Because now you're starting to sound a bit mad."

"No, Ginny, listen up. Let me rephrase it: if everyone _thought_ we weren't together anymore, the risk for you wouldn't be as big," he said.

The redhead furrowed her brows in realization. "You want us to make everyone believe we're broken up."

"Before you say anything, I've got to tell you that I don't… love the idea. I really don't. Part of me tells me I should do it for real. An even bigger part tells me not to do anything, to just let us be the way we've been all year. But… if anything happened to you, it would kill me and it would feel even worse if I didn't know that at least I'd tried something to keep it from happening. That I wasn't _completely_ selfish."

Ginny didn't say anything for several moments and simply looked at him, thoughtful. She was in a dilemma herself. "What will you do if I refuse?" she asked

"I don't know, Gin. I really don't know." He sighed. "I know you deserve more than some… top secret relationship and if you want out, I won't blame you…"

She chuckled dryly. "You're an idiot," she said.

"What?"

"I said you're an idiot," she repeated. "You told me you couldn't break up with me because you were selfish. Well, guess what, genius? I'm selfish too and I'll be damned if you're going to talk me into breaking up with you myself."

"I wasn't trying to…"

"Yeah, I know you weren't. Consciously," Ginny said. "Now shut up and listen. A few minutes ago when you started talking about us not being together, you nearly gave me a heart attack. And if you hadn't fixed it in time and told me you weren't actually talking about going ahead with it, you wouldn't be returning to your dorm-room in a very good shape." She sighed like she was ashamed for admitting that. "Look, months ago, when what we had was still fresh, I could have been the understanding Ginny who accepted that her boyfriend was breaking up with her to protect her with a really cool face. I really could and Merlin knows that would have hurt like hell. But now… now I wouldn't have been able to pull that off to after we've been together for over a year and that has been the best year of my life too, despite the mess the world is in. Maybe it's because this relationship has spoiled me or because today I'm even more arse over elbow in love with you than I was one year ago. But if you'd really called me down here to break up with me for some _stupid_ noble reason, you'd have bat boogies flying out of your nose right up until you realized just what a stupid thing you were doing."

"I figured you might do something like that," Harry mumbled.

"Good," Ginny said, pleased with herself. She sighed, then, and reached softly for his hand. "And about that fake-breakup… I'm not a big fan of it but I'm willing to go along with it anyway."

There was a silent pause, then, only ended by Harry's "short question. "Why?"

"Because it will make things easier for you," she told him simply. "And because, if something happened to me – which it won't –, I'd want you to know it wasn't your fault because we'd tried."

He should be happy she was going along with it, yet he didn't really feel that way. Maybe it was because he still had confessions to make. "Before we put that plan into practice, there's something you should know, Ginny." He had only told that to Ron and Hermione before her and it was only because… well, because he hadn't been able to stop the words before they came out of his mouth. Now, he was telling it to Ginny. "Next year… next year I don't think I'll be coming back to the school. Too many people are getting hurt while I'm here at Hogwarts – the Horcruxes are out there and I need to find every one of them fast so I can stop _him_ and end this stupid war."

Ginny looked away from him, into the fire and Harry's eyes remained on her – her reaction was a mystery to him. He'd imagined she might yell at him for that, look shocked for a while or maybe hurt that he'd be leaving her behind. It was none of it.

"I can't say I'm surprised," she confessed faintly – the thought might make her nervous but she'd always known it was coming. "I knew this would happen sooner or later – that you'd have to leave. I knew you… we wouldn't be able to be really happy until Voldemort was gone." She faced him again. "Will Ron and Hermione go along?"

Harry nodded, surprised she was taking that so… coolly. "I mentioned it to them and they said they would. I tried to convince them not to but it didn't work." He sighed. "Ginny, please tell me you're not planning to join us too."

"I'd be lying if I told you that," she confessed.

"Gin…"

"You can't change my mind from this," she told him before he could finish. "Just as soon as I turn seventeen and am free of the trace, I'll be off to join you if you're still out there." He seemed surprised she'd thought of the underage magic problem – he'd been ready to use that argument if she insisted on going. "I'm not stupid, Harry. It's still more than a year before I turn seventeen but I know better than to go with you before it comes: if I did, I'd be a risk to you if I used magic and a burden if I didn't."

"You've given this a lot of thought, haven't you?" he realized.

She nodded. "I've seen this coming ever since you first told me about the Horcruxes, Harry. I even was blunt enough to go to Dumbledore and ask him if there was any way around the trace – he told me that if there was one, he'd failed to find it when he'd searched back when he was young. I'll have to wait until it goes away on its own and, in the meantime, I'll keep an eye on Hogwarts for you." She paused. "Of course, I'm hoping that I won't have to join you in your quest at all because you'll be back by the time I turn seventeen."

"I'm hoping for that too," Harry confessed.

She gave him a little smile that didn't last more than a second. "So, I take it you'll wait until your birthday too before you leave. We still have that time, don't we?"

"I don't think I can put it off much longer than that, Gin," Harry said.

She nodded. "Well, you could wait for Bill and Fleur's wedding – it will be on the day after your birthday," she said. "It will be a good way to end this… chapter of your life and start the new one where you hunt Voldemort. Plus, I really wanted a chance to dance with you. To make up for the Yule Ball."

"If we go along with this fake breakup, we shouldn't really be seen close together in public," Harry pointed out.

Ginny shrugged. "We'll find a way around it."

"So, you really will go along with this?"

She nodded. "I've already told you I would do it for you. Did _you _change your mind?"

Harry shook his head. "I was just thinking it will be a pain to have to pretend we're at odds all the time."

"On a more positive note, I've always heard that sneaking out is pretty fun," Ginny stated with a nervous laugh. "We can always meet like this every now and then. And we have just a couple more weeks here at Hogwarts. I suppose at home we don't have to pretend because, well, we can trust our families to keep it a secret, don't you think?"

Harry nodded. "Yeah, I guess. We shouldn't tell anyone we're planning this, though. Only afterwards. If they don't look surprised, it might make hard for other people to believe."

"Honestly, Harry, I think that the people who know us will find it hard to believe anyway if we just tell them we've split up," Ginny said.

"Well, we should put up quite a convincing public show for them then, shouldn't we?" Harry suggested. "How good are your acting skills?"

Her lips curled. "Well, we can say the twins and I have a lot in common on that," she said proudly. "I can put up a good show."

Harry nodded. "Alright, then. So, just to make it official…" He shifted his position so he was face-to-face with her and reached for both her hands. "Ginny Weasley, will you fake-break up with me?"

She had to smile – how stupid was it that the stupid question sounded so romantic to her? Ridiculous. "Just say the place and time."

"Tomorrow at Dumbledore's funeral?" he suggested. "After it, I mean."

_So soon_, she thought. But it had to be done that way. And it would not be real. "It's a date, then." She leaned closer to him. "I'm going to kiss you now."

"Okay," he said wearily just before his girlfriend's – soon to be know publically as ex-girlfriend's – lips touched his own. He hoped everyone would buy it as he simply didn't know what else to do.

* * *

**Present time**

By the time Harry was finished explaining the whole thing to his godparents, leaving out a few details such as his plans not to attend the school in the following year – he couldn't bring himself to do it as he was still gathering courage to break those news to them – Sirius seemed to be tempted to laugh.

"It was an act?" Mia asked him, her tone tinted with disbelief. "The whole thing?"

Harry nodded. "And apparently it was convincing enough," he said, satisfied.

Sirius snorted. "Convincing? It was brilliant, kid. Maybe a bit too loud with the yelling but just enough so it would catch everyone's attention." The news would be all over the school in less than an hour and, if the kid was lucky – or really unlucky – Skeeter would be typing an article about him being the newest bachelor at Hogwarts to _Witches' Weakly_ by the end of the day. He had to chuckle. "You do realize her handprint is still all over your face, don't you?"

Harry groaned and rubbed his own cheek again. "That part wasn't really planned. I'm assuming she was trying to improvise…"

His godfather snorted. "It was worth the look on your face."

Mia sighed from where she sat. "Merlin, Harry, you really had me worried," she said. Ginny had been his rock for so long… The thought of him ending things with her just like that had made her more fearful than she liked to admit. "You know you didn't have to do that, don't you? Fake a breakup? You know there are so many people around who'd do anything to make sure Ginny is safe. Her parents, her brothers… even us."

Harry nodded. "I know but… I don't want to risk it, okay? It's safer this way."

"So, what are you going to tell people if they ask you why you broke up?" Sirius asked him.

Harry shrugged. "We're still trying to figure it out. We'll probably say that after what happened to Dumbledore, I didn't feel like I could deal with being tied up to a girl. Everyone thinks I've lost a few bolts over it, anyway – makes sense us ending things would be my fault."

"And are you sure that Voldemort himself will believe? Or even care?" Mia asked. "Honestly, Harry, I don't think he cares much about teenage romances."

"No, but he cares about who he can use as leverage against me. An ex-girlfriend, especially one I broke up with in such bad terms wouldn't be of any use to him. I'm sure a few Slytherins will make sure the news reach him soon enough, probably with a few dark rumours attached to make it sound even worse."

"And what about your…" Sirius paused and pointed at his own head "…connection thingy? Don't you think he can see it's a lie through it?"

Harry shook his head. "Dumbledore taught me Occlumency all year in our lessons after what happened in the Department of Mysteries. I'm a lot better at it now – he could barely enter my mind the last time we tried it," he stated. "Look, I'll keep practicing every waking moment if I have to but Voldemort won't enter my head ever again if I can help it."

"So you're really sure you did the right thing?" Mia asked.

Harry nodded. "I know I did," he said, sighing. "Look, I'd do the same with you all – the two of you, Izzy, Alex and Mary – if I could but it's harder to fake-break up with your family and, honestly, _that _Voldemort would never buy."

"Harry!" Mia said, livid. "Don't even _think_ about that!"

"You worry about protecting yourself and let _us_ worry about _ourselves_," Sirius told him more evenly. "Seems only fair, doesn't it?"

Harry sighed. "I guess," he said, standing up. "So, I probably should go back to the castle before people start wondering where I am."

His godparents nodded and got up too. Before any could reach for the door, Mia took a step further and wrapped her godson in an unexpected hug.

"You're too selfless for your own good, you know?" she asked.

Harry sighed before pulling away a bit. Funny, he thought just the opposite…

* * *

Later that day at Grimmauld Place, everything was ready – or as ready as it could be – for the Order meeting that was to take place there. And as agreed, around five that evening – roughly a half hour before the meeting was scheduled to– Mad-Eye was ringing the doorbell of the house and Sirius was already making his way to open it.

Yet when he did, his face shifted into a frown. "What is _he _doing here?" Sirius asked, his eyes narrowing at the sight of Mundungus Fletcher standing by Mad-Eye's side on _his_ porch – it was no news that one caused trouble wherever he went and not the sort of fun trouble Sirius, as a respectable Marauder, appreciated.

Mundungus looked ready to protest Sirius's question. "Oi, I'm part of the ord…"

Mad-Eye smacked him on the back of the head. "Be quiet, you slimy crook," he said before turning to Sirius. "Caught this one plotting in Knockturn Alley to smuggle a bunch of stolen fake jewelry and sell it as protection amulets in Diagon Alley."

"That was a misunderstanding. I was just…"

"Shut it, Fletcher!" Moody barked at him – if his words hadn't been what had done the job shutting the other man up, certainly the I'll beat-you-to-a-bloody-pulp look in his mangled face had.

"And you brought him here because…" Sirius inquisitively said.

"Figured I should keep an eye on him in case he tried to skip the meeting and put the plan in action instead – would you rather have a few dozens of fools walking around exposed because they thought they have some bogus amulet to protect them?"

Sirius groaned. "Fine," he said, stepping away from the door so they could get in.

Mia was coming down the stairs by the time Sirius closed the front door and raised an eyebrow at her husband, also confused by Mundungus Fletcher's presence along with Moody – it hadn't occurred to her that, being part of the Order, he might show up for the meeting, never mind show early with Moody.

Sirius shrugged and pointed at the former auror. "His fault," he said.

"Well, will you show me where the centre of the wards is or what?" the former auror said.

"The what?" Mia asked, confused. She'd never actually heard of it.

"The centre of the wards!" Mad-Eye said. "It's where the core of a house's wards is."

"And how are we supposed to know where it is?" Sirius asked. "We never messed with the wards ourselves."

"Don't know where…" Mad-Eye mumbled under his breath in disgust.

"Maybe I could go look for it," Mundungus suggested all too innocently.

"To get your hands on a bunch of heirlooms while you're on it, no doubt," Mad-Eye barked in return before turning to Sirius and Mia. "Just take me to the house-elf – he ought to know where it is."

Mia nodded. "He's just upstairs, keeping an eye on the kids in the living room."

"Maybe I could just stay in here…" Mundungus suggested – so much stuff around that he'd love to get his hands into… "Busted a knee the other week and all those stairs…"

Moody grabbed him by the collar. "Nice try. I'm not letting you out of my sight for a moment." And with that, he pulled the man behind him up the stairs.

As expected, they found Kreacher in the living room, who informed them that the centre of the wards was located in the house's attic at the same time he helped little Alex build some sort of tower with his construction blocks, which was rapidly becoming almost as tall as him.

Satisfied, Mad-Eye once again pulled Fletcher up the many flights of stairs that led up to the attic, guided by Mia, who offered to take them up there as Sirius usually avoided going up to the topmost floors of the house where his old room as well as his late brother's one were located.

While the three were up there, Sirius spent a few minutes watching little Mary as she attempted to sit up inside her portable bassinet, squealing in delight when she succeeded, and then helping Alex reach the top of his tower, now definitely taller than him, to place one last block up there before he decided to make his way back down to the ground floor, leaving the kids under Kreacher's watchful eye, as people were bound to start arriving for the meeting soon enough.

It wasn't more than five minutes after he reached the ground floor that he first heard the sound of someone flooing downstairs in the kitchen– and since most of the Order didn't have a floo-connection to the house, Sirius figured it ought to be someone they had over frequently like Remus, Lulu or Elizabeth.

He was right the third time as only four or five steps into the stairwell, he heard the blonde healer's voice. Only she wasn't alone in there.

"…_I told you should have stayed home! Floo travelling isn't good for healing, especially when it comes to ribs and other bones_," she was scolding someone. "_Keep this up and you won't be back to active work for the rest of the month._"

Curious, Sirius descended further down the stairs – it was more than clear she wasn't talking to her father or her kids since, as far as he knew, none of them had injured ribs. In fact, the only person he could recall that had taken a rib injury lately was…

"_Relax, Beth, it's just a little twinge. Didn't land quite the way I'd planned_." The other person replied. And if the rib injury hadn't given him away, the slow, deep voice that said those words certainly did. A few more steps down the stairs allowed Sirius to peak through the kitchen's door and spot by the fireplace not only Elizabeth Harper but also Head Auror Kingsley Shacklebolt. Now, why those two had arrived together, was something he could only imagine…

"_You're just a stubborn arse, you know?_" she was telling him. "_I could have easily discussed the matters you want to bring into the meeting myself and then tell you about it when I got home. I'm very articulate with words, you know?_"

Kingsley chuckled, motioning to stand up. "_I know you are, Beth, but I'd rather argue my own points. I'm fine, really. I just need to find Moody to have a word with him_."

Elizabeth sighed. "_Just don't let me hear you're putting too much strain on those ribs or else I'm holding you hostage in my place for the rest of the month_."

And as she finished saying that, she leaned further and kissed him. Really kissed him. _Well, _Sirius thought, _this is an interesting turn of events._ Elizabeth Harper had a boyfriend and it was actually a pretty decent bloke unlike her ex-husband who still was on the run from the goblins for owning them a small fortune lost in gambling.

He didn't have the chance to go on with his thinking as, just as soon as she pulled away from the kiss, Kingsley started to motion towards the kitchen doorway, probably headed to the stairs – and then meant he'd run straight into Sirius and see he was eavesdropping. That would be bad.

Quickly, he improvised and made a little noise with his feet to make it sound like he was just coming down the stairs and, just as Kingsley as about to reach the doorway, Sirius pretended he almost ran into him. "Oh, sorry about that Kingsley. Didn't know you were here," he lied.

Kingsley shook his head. "No harm done. I've just arrived. Moody doesn't happen to be here already, does he?"

"He's in the attic messing with the wards," Sirius informed him. "But if you wait for him in the dining room, I figure he shouldn't take much longer up there."

"Yeah, I'll do that, thanks," the auror replied, walking up the stairs with difficulty.

Just as soon as he was gone, Sirius decided to enter the kitchen, only to find Elizabeth standing there raising her eyebrows at him. "How much did you hear?"

"Oh, more than enough. So," he said, grinning, "do you treat all your patients with such… affection?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Only the ones I'm engaged to."

Sirius's eyes opened wide. "The ones you're _what_ to?"

"Engaged. As in 'fiancée of'," she said calmly. "It happened a few days ago and, before you ask, no, Mia doesn't know about Kingsley and I. I was going to tell her a couple of days ago but then there was the battle… Please do me a favour and let me tell her myself, okay?"

"I… sure. And congratulations, I guess," Sirius said awkwardly. "Little question, though: is Kingsley the bloke I almost caught you with in New Year's when Mary was born?"

Elizabeth blushed. "Yeah, that was him," she admitted, embarrassed. "Only my dad and the kids know about us being together other than you and, well, hopefully Mia soon. We've been keeping it quiet because he'd the head Auror and there are risks inherent to his position. We'd like it to remain that way."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "These secret relationships for the sake of safety are becoming a really lame trend," he commented.

She raised her eyebrows. "What makes you say that?"

He shrugged. "Never mind. My lips are sealed if that's what you want. But another question: why does he get to call you Beth and us common mortals can't even use a nickname without you trying to bite our heads off?" Sirius asked.

Her lips curled. "For the same reason he gets to shag me and you don't."

"Who gets to shag who?" Mia asked as she stepped into the room, her expression slightly confused.

"Long story," Elizabeth told her.

"Well, Mad-Eye said the wards were fine," she announced.

"Good, that's good," her husband responded, noting that Elizabeth was giving him a 'get lost' look, intending to use the opportunity to share the news with Mia. He cleared his throat, taking a step back. "Why don't I leave you girls to talk?"

Mia gave him a strange look as he retreated but didn't protest against his quick exit.

People started arriving quickly in the minutes that followed and gathering inside the dining room, waiting for the meeting to start. It was slightly odd to see the Minister of Magic entering his house as a regular guest when she arrived with McGonagall, who'd offered to show her where the meeting was, and sitting at his dining table. If she weren't talking to Kingsley with such a serious look on her face, one might have believed she was there for a dinner-party of some sort.

Mia and Elizabeth joined everyone in the dining room minutes before the meeting took place, arm in arm and all secrets and smiles like two girls in their teenage years – seemed Mia had taken the news of the engagement well. When the 'assembly', as Mad-Eye referred it, started, everyone sat around the table and remained quiet.

The meeting started with Madam Bones's formal introduction to the Order and her explanation of her reasons behind joining the order. Ironically maybe, the Minister confessed not to fully trust the Ministry itself and to believe that likely there were moles in several departments, though she wasn't sure who they were. Furthermore, she informed them that she was in negotiations with several foreign ministries to create secret refugee protocols to help several witches and wizards escape the country in the eventuality of Voldemort taking it over.

"And since I am tempted not to fully trust my staff, I'll only disclose any information concerning these protocols to the Order, hoping you will help me putting them into practice," Bones told them.

Other matters followed that one, such as the Muggle Prime Minister's protection, which was made Kingsley's responsibility as soon as he was fully healed, as well as the arrangement of rotating patrols in Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade and other important places in the Wizarding World.

It wasn't until Harry's name came to the discussion that it had Sirius and Mia's full attention.

"Alright, not that this is solved, we need to discuss Potter," Moody stated. "He's our main concern here."

"Yes, Alastor is right," Kingsley added. "Dumbledore said it himself. His last words to me were: '_Harry is the best hope we have'_. We have reasons to believe that his safety is essential in the middle of all this."

"Well, this house is a fortress," Mad-Eye stated. "I checked it myself earlier. If he stays here until the school re-starts, nobody will be able to get him."

"You don't actually expect Harry to remain locked in this house the whole summer, do you?" Mia asked sceptically. "Even if his friends visited him here, he'd be bored by the end of the first week. There's no way we'll make him stay here until school starts again."

"You'd rather put him in danger so he can have a little freedom?" the former auror said.

"We'd rather he wasn't miserable and that's how he'll feel like if we let you turn his home into his prison," Sirius said icily – _he _knew his share about prisons.

"Well, at least he'd be safe!"

McGonagall was the one to speak. "Alastor, calm yourself," she told the other man. "Sirius and Mia are as good as Harry's parents and, more than anyone else in this table, they have a say about what is decided about him. Not to mention that they are right."

"Minerva…" Mad-Eye started.

"It's unthinkable to put a sixteen-year-old boy in house-arrest for something he's not even guilty of – being a target," the headmistress. "As a teacher, I can't support that idea and I'm sure we can find a better solution."

"Harry is always welcome at the Burrow," Arthur Weasley told them. "And since Moody is already reinforcing our wards to turn the shed into our new headquarters, I think it would be safe for him to spend time there too."

"Didn't he and Ginny just break up after the funeral?" Tonks pointed out suddenly, unaware of the truth behind the scene she'd witnessed. "I'm not against the plan, I'm just saying it ought to be awkward for her to have her ex-boyfriend around all the time after such a… bad breakup."

While many seemed pretty uninterested about the matter, three of four members, manly women, nodded in approval. Sirius had to fight the urge to grin – yep, the dramatic fake breakup had indeed worked: if people in the Order had bought it, he doubted many students wouldn't.

Molly cleared the throat. "Well, yes, but Ron is still Harry's best friend. The Burrow is a big place. I'm sure there's plenty of space for him and Ginny to avoid each other. It won't be an issue, I'm sure. He'd be safe there," Molly said – her tone was so unconcerned that Sirius guessed Ginny might have already explained hers and Harry's act to her parents.

"Or, on the contrary," George said, eyes narrowed, "maybe he won't. Merlin knows him being there will give Gin-Gin a chance to get back at the little prat for dumping her. We're more than inclined to help."

"Nothing deadly, though," Fred added as if it was a soothing thought. "She'll enjoy watching him squirm." He turned to Sirius and Mia. "No offence."

This time, and judging by the looks of agreement shared by Bill and Charlie, he guessed Molly still hadn't come around to telling her sons that the breakup was bogus. Sirius could only hope she'd do it soon, before the twins mailed Harry some sort giant dung-bomb as payback.

"Boys!" their mother said warningly. "Mind our own business! This is not the time or place."

The twins shrugged and leaned in synchrony against the back of their chairs with their arms crossed, plotting looks on their faces.

"Fine! He can stay either at home or the Burrow. Period," Mad-Eye accepted. "See? Problem solved: Potter's not confined to one place."

"No, that's still _not_ fine, Moody," Mia stated, her tone edgy. "Now he's just confined to _two_ of them. Are you even listening to yourself? Harry's not your property or anyone else's – not even mine and _I'_ve raised him from the time when he wore diapers. You… no, _we_ don't get to just sit around a table and decide where he can and cannot go like he's some pet – Harry will be off age as of the end of next month, for Merlin's sake!"

"According to what Dumbledore believed, he may also be essential to defeat Voldemort!" Mad-Eye spat back. "He can't just parade around unprotected, all but asking to be killed!"

"And he won't," Sirius told him. "The kid's neither a moron nor suicidal, Moody. But he's not some puppet that's supposed to be shut in some box until someone needs to use him. He's a person with brains who gets to have a choice about his life. If anything, Mia and I can have a talk with him about where we think are the safest places for him to be and then it will be _up to_ _him_ to follow our advice. Either he does or not, we'll always be around to protect him."

"They have a point, Moody," Kingsley agreed. "You're going too far with this protection thing. From what I've seen, Harry's a very smart kid – need I to remind you that it was his idea to spread Felix Felicis among the fighters in the battle two days ago, which may have spared our side from countless injuries and deaths?" He might not have taken the potion himself but it had certainly soothed him knowing that everyone else had better odds of being safe because of it.

"You got that right," Bill Weasley mumbled diplomatically – as bummed as he might be with Harry over 'breaking up' with his sister, he couldn't deny that it was nothing short of luck that had made some chandelier suddenly fall down right between him and Greyback when the latter had been about to jump him to do Merlin-knew-what. He owed Harry for that.

"Then what do your enlightened brains say about what we'll do if Potter decides he doesn't want to follow our advice," Mad-Eye finally asked.

"I honestly doubt he'll want to cause much trouble, Moody," Remus vouched for Harry. "Harry is a good kid. He's not that rebellious."

His wife nodded in agreement. "Remus is right," Tonks said. "If anything, he may want to go out on Muggle London or Diagon Alley a few times. We can form a small guard to accompany him. I wouldn't mind joining it."

"That seems like a good idea," Kingsley agreed. "A small guard should keep him safe enough if they took, for instance some sort of emergency Portkey to get him to a safe place quickly in case of attack. I'd also offer to join it myself but looking after the Prime Minister ought to keep me busy on its own."

The next seconds were filled with half a dozen members offering their services to the guard even though they weren't even sure it would be needed at all. That solution seemed to be good enough for them – provided Harry would agree, which they were sure he would. At this point, when they could feel the time when Harry would have to stand against Voldemort approaching, Mia recognized that a piece of advice that Dumbledore had given them was becoming more and more precious: it was time Harry made his own decisions.

"Now, there's something else we need to discuss, still about Harry," Kingsley stated, taking over as Mad-Eye seemed to have taken to moping after his idea had been flatly rejected.

"You know, maybe we should have brought the kid along if we wanted to discuss so much stuff about him," Sirius said.

Kingsley shook his head. "It's related to him but it doesn't concern him directly… yet, at least. Just listen up. It's no secret that You-Know-Who attracted him to the Department of Mysteries by sending him through that… connection they have fake metal images of Sirius and Mia being tortured there. He may do that again. Use some kind of bait."

"Harry won't fall for it," Sirius said with certainty. "He told me himself this morning that he's gotten a lot better at Occlumency – he won't fall for _illusions_ again."

"No, but unfortunately this shows he'd be reckless enough to go after his family if they were in need, no matter what the danger was," he said. "What if this time You-Know-Who really takes someone?"

"We'll be careful," Mia said. "There's no way we'll let himget his hands on anyone from this family."

"He wasn't referring your side of the family, Mia," Elizabeth told her – clearly, she and Kingsley had already discussed that matter, likely during the time he'd been recovering from his injuries at her place. "Lily had a sister, remember?"

"Petunia?" Mia asked, confused. "Harry has never even met her. She refused to take him in when Lily and James were killed, remember? Why would anyone use her as bait?"

"Blood's thicker than water," Mad-Eye said easily. "Potter's got a hero complex – the snake-faced bastard knows that. Can you be sure he wouldn't run to save his aunt and her family even if just for the sake of blood?"

The answer was easy: she couldn't. Mad-Eye had a point – Harry was too brave for his own good. She didn't think he would just leave the blood family he'd never known to die if the time came. Not that they really deserved it his help. "What do you want to do about them, then?"

"Send them into hiding under the Order's protection," Kingsley said. "It would be good for both sides: they would be safe and we wouldn't have to worry about You-Know-Who using them."

Sirius shook his head. "They'll never go along with it – Petunia hated magic and her husband was no better. They treated Lily like crap because of that."

"Maybe if someone explained the risk to them, they'd consider it," Madam Bones suggested. "They may hate magic but I'm sure they love their lives more."

"Yes, faced with the danger they may be more receptive," Kingsley agreed before clearing his throat. "They might be even more receptive if someone they already knew went there to explain the situation." He looked at Mia and waited for her to say something.

"You want me to be that person," she said flatly. "

"Lily was your best friend – you raised their nephew," the auror said. "It makes sense."

"I could do it too," Elizabeth offered. "I've met Petunia before."

Mia was silent for a few moments. She hadn't seen Petunia more than three or four times in her life, when she'd visit Lily in her parents' home during her school years, and through those few times Petunia had either ignored Lily or treated her horribly. According to her late best friend, her husband, Vernon Dursley, was just as unpleasant. They hadn't even been there for her wedding. And then, there was them refusing to take Harry in. That memory was bittersweet. Sweet – maybe selfishly so – because if they hadn't refused him, she would have never been given Harry to raise. Bitter they had been selfish enough to refuse an innocent little boy who'd just lost his parents and had nearly been killed himself.

Mia couldn't say she hated Petunia Evans – she didn't know her well enough for that. But she certainly resented her for treating her family the way she had.

Still, Kingsley had a point – Petunia and her family being safely hidden would give them one less thing for them to worry about. She turned to her husband, who shrugged, silently letting her know he'd go along with whatever she decided.

"It's okay, Elizabeth," she told her friend. "I'll do it. For Harry."

Kingsley nodded. "I'll dig up their address and send it to you when I have it."

Mia nodded silently in return as she felt her husband's hand reaching for her own.

Mad-Eye cleared his throat. "Now, ahead…"

The discussion didn't continue for much longer, from then on, with Kingsley and Mad-Eye leading most of the discussion. It wasn't more than ten minutes that the people started to leave the table, standing in groups discussing privately the decisions taken during the meeting.

Sirius and Mia remained sat side-by-side, silently for a few moments before he spoke. "You sure you can want to go talk to them? Harry's relatives?"

Mia nodded. "I'm sure."

"You did a good thing, love," he told her. "Not sure I would have done it myself. You do know I'll be right there with you."

She gave him a thankful smile. "I knew you would." Sighing, she rested her head on his shoulder. "But now that I think of it, I think it's time we have a little talk with the Dursleys. It's been delayed for almost sixteen years already, after all."

**A/N: Well, I hope you liked the extra big chapter it was nice to write, though there were a few... casualties while it was under development (I have officially bought the crappiest laptop in the world!). Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	31. Meet the Dursleys

**A/N: It happened again. An abnormally large chapter (that I really didn't mean to be this big). Enjoy...**

In the night after the Order of the Phoenix's meeting at 12 Grimmauld Place, a small letter containing two addresses was hand-delivered to Sirius and Mia by Elizabeth as a favour to Kingsley (still forcibly home-ridden). When handing the note to them, the healer explained that the first address, _4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey _was Petunia's actual address while the second one, an _8 Wisteria Walk_ also located in Little Whinging, was where they should floo to since it was inhabited by an ally of the order, Arabella Figg.

"Apparently, Figg is a squib who used to be friends with Dumbledore – Kingsley said she came to his funeral and everything – and he put her in charge of keeping an eye on the Dursleys for the past sixteen years," Elizabeth had explained to them. "Kingsley has already informed her you should be coming by there soon."

And while they'd been thankful that the Head Auror had been so quick to dig up the Dursleys' address for them despite his ongoing recovery, part of Mia really wished he hadn't been able to, so she wouldn't need to go there and face them. It was silly how she even tried to change her mind several times before she and Sirius had to head to Surrey in order to meet them when, deep down, she knew that she'd never forgive herself if she didn't go there – after all, there was the issue of them maybe be used against Harry and Mia simply couldn't let the potential unpleasantness of seeing Petunia again get in the way of her godson's safety.

Harry's reaction when his godfather told him in the morning of the following day about his and Mia's plans to visit Petunia had been of plain lack of interest, which was pretty understandable, all things considered. After all, he'd never even met his Muggle relatives and they barely meant anything to them (even though he'd admitted to Sirius that he didn't think he would have been able to just leave them to die if Voldemort abducted them to get to him) and he had other things to worry about like his plans about how to sneak out with Ginny now that everyone thought they were broken up.

So, around mid-afternoon, Sirius and Mia took the floo and travelled to Arabella Figg's house. They landed on a small room – a living room – with old furniture and that smelled strongly of cabbage. Its walls seemed to be covered with unmoving photographs of several cats, which vaguely reminded Sirius of Umbridge's plate collection. It wasn't more than a couple of seconds later that a short old woman with grey hear wearing a hairnet and a lavender robe stepped into the room, followed by several cats, one of which pawed its way onto an armchair, curling on it before starting to lick itself.

"Oh, you most the people from the Order," the woman said in a rough voice, walking to them. "Kingsley Shacklebolt said you were coming. I'm Arabella Figg." She offered her hand to shake and the seconds that followed were occupied by a few introductions. "So you're here to convince the Dursleys to scram. Well, good luck dealing with them. Uptight lot, they are."

"So, you know them?" Mia asked her.

Figgs nodded. "I babysat for them a few times – they think I'm barmy so they use me to bore the little one for misbehaving." She shook her head in disapproval. "Think they're all sophisticated when actually they're just a bunch of unpleasant berks. The husband, Vernon, only cares about his drill-business and showing off his cars for the neighbours – practically gets a new one every couple of years. A waste of money, I'd say. And Petunia, the wife," Figgs shook her head, "that one spends her days cleaning the house and spying on her neighbours. And their boy. Oh, don't even get me started on that one: spoiled rotten by his parents, spent his days kicking my cats and beating small kids at the park with his gang … At least he's calmed down lately and grew enough brains to dump the gang but still… it's a relief when he's off at his fancy boarding school."

"Well, don't they just sound delightful?" Sirius said dryly, his voice full of sarcasm.

Mrs. Figgs nodded, understanding what he meant. "A bloody frivolous couple Petunia and Vernon are. If you want my opinion, those two don't like each other these days any more than I do. Few years ago, six or seven, it was the middle of the night and my Mr. Tibbles ran," she nodded at one of the cats, "so I had to go after him – passed in front of their house on the way back and saw some bloke parking the car there and going in. Vernon was out of town then and, if you asked me, Petunia was having a little _side-dish_ if you know what I mean." She shook her head in disapproval. "We all know what that has led to…" she mumbled to herself. "The way she treats that poor child…"

Sirius didn't quite catch that part but couldn't help thinking of what a great source for dirt Arabella Figg was…

"Well, you're the ones who raised Harry Potter, aren't you? He's their nephew. Well, tell him he's much better off without them, will you? I suppose you need to get going to handle your business now," the squib said.

The older woman walked them to the door, then, and quickly told them what way they should take to get from her place to the Dursleys' house.

They religiously followed Figg's instructions from there and, after walking for several minutes, they saw themselves in a neighbourhood that seemed to have row upon row of strictly identical houses perched on strictly identical and neatly-trimmed lawns.

"Holy crap," Sirius mumbled, looking at the sight in front of him as they reached Privet Drive. "How can anyone live here? Seems like something straight out of a nightmare." Not one sign of individualism on those houses like all inhabitants shared a gigantic too neat, too strict and too boring brain.

"You know, some people just like… symmetry," Mia offered diplomatically.

"Well, not me, that's for sure," Sirius mumbled as they walked along the sidewalk, trying to find number four, where the Dursleys lived.

They spotted it a few minutes later, and it was no exception to the identical layout of all houses on the street – the only difference was that there was no car parked in front of it, unlike many other houses nearby. Vernon, the car's proud owner, according to Mrs. Figg, must still be at work, Sirius concluded.

They made their way to the front door and, for each step she took closer to it, Mia grew more displeased. It was like the house itself had some sort of negative aura that sucked a good mood out of a person… or maybe it was just the fact that such a hateful person lived inside it… Taking a deep breath as one of her hands remained liked to her husband's, Mia rang the doorbell and waited for an answer.

The few seconds that passed between her ringing and the door opening felt like hours. She looked at Sirius nervously and he gave her an encouraging smile.

"It's gonna be fine, love," he told her.

"Stop me if I get too loud yelling at her, will you?" she asked him.

Actually, he was sort of looking forward for a shouting match – there was something especially hot about his wife, primal even, when she yelled at someone. Sort of like a lion roaring to protect her cubs. "I thought we'd agreed I wouldn't make promises I couldn't keep," he replied, grinning a little.

"Sirius," she warned, frowning just as they heard the door-lock click.

Both turned to the door at the same time only to see a thin, blonde-haired woman with an awfully long neck standing behind it as it opened.

At first sight, Sirius thought, she didn't look a thing like Lily as one might have expected. At second sight, the case remained just the same. If anything, when one was looking really closely and purposely searching for family traits, they might find something in her nose slightly – only slightly – similar to Lily's, though that might very well be just a product of their imagination… Maybe Kingsley had given them wrong address, after all, he figured, and they were facing a complete stranger. _Not the case_, he concluded, glimpsing the recognition in his wife's eyes as she looked at the woman.

"Can I help you?" Petunia said with a pleasant yet suspicious tone, scanning both of them from head to toe with her greenish brown eyes.

"Petunia Evans Dursley?" Mia asked in a highly contained tone, just to make sure she wasn't wrong about the woman's identity.

"Yes, that's me," Petunia confirmed, her eyes growing even more guarded. "I don't believe we've met before."

"We have, actually," Mia corrected, not all that surprised that Petunia didn't remember her – after all, Petunia had never even tried to make a good job out of hiding her disdain for Lily's non-Muggle friends. "My name is Mia Davis Black," she introduced herself before gesturing to Sirius. "And this is my husband, Sirius. We were friends of Lily's – I was one of her best friends, in fact. We've met a few times when I'd visit her at your parents' house."

As if her suspicions had been confirmed, the other woman's face hardened and she pursed her lips tightly, giving herself a look that, in Sirius's book, sort of made her look like a horse when combined with the long shape of her angular face. "I don't want anything to do with _your kind_." She said that last part venomously like she was referring a bunch of lepers or something of that sort before trying to close back the door.

Sirius blocked her by shoving his foot between the door and the frame, which had Petunia glaring at him. "I think you'll want to make an exception this time, if you care for your own safety," he warned her.

She stared this time, appalled. "Is that a threat?"

"No, it's a statement of a fact," Mia told her sharply. "Believe me, us coming here is just as unpleasant to us as it is to you, Petunia."

Sirius nodded in agreement. "Now, do you want to keep on talking out here at the front porch where all your neighbours can see us or will you let us come in?"

That seemed to work as a charm as Petunia suddenly turned her attention to the windows of the nearby houses, scanning them with eagle eyes for peeping neighbours (and quickly spotting suspicious curtain movements through some windows). Reluctantly, she opened the door further and stepped out of the way. "Just get in. Quickly," she hissed in a not-so- welcoming tone. She wouldn't want to call the neighbours' attention to the stranger couple standing at her doorway even if they were perfectly dressed in Muggle clothes.

Pleased with her uneasiness, Sirius and Mia stepped into the house. Inside, the entrance hall was not very large but everything seemed to be squeaky clean to the point of near-sparkling – it was almost like a museum instead of somewhere where people actually lived daily…

Although it seemed like the house was permanently ready for guests, Petunia didn't waste time with pleasantries as she guided them to the kitchen instead of the living room, as if not wanting them to soil it with their 'unholy presence'.

"Well? What do you want?" Petunia asked sharply as they stepped into the equally spotless kitchen.

"Why, you're just a charming host, aren't you, _Mrs. Dursley_?" Sirius asked her dryly as he took a seat on one of her chairs even though he hadn't been invited – something in Petunia just made him want to irritate her, which, at the moment, seemed to be just the case, judging by the look on the woman's face.

Even though she usually made a bigger effort to be pleasant, Mia couldn't help doing the same as her husband, sitting down on a chair too. She was about to speak when, suddenly, the glass door that led to the back garden opened up and a little girl, about six or seven years-old, stepped through it.

She looked like a little doll with flawless pale skin and shoulder-lenght hair that wasn't quite as blonde as Petunia's, having a reddish hint on it – one might call it strawberry blonde – which deeply contrasted with the dull uniform-like gray dress she was wearing over a white blouse. "Mommy?" she asked in a quiet tone, her eyes the same colour as her mother's widened with curiosity as she looked at Sirius as Mia.

Petunia turned to the little girl, her eyes not showing any warmth. "Didn't I tell you to stay outside and play?" she asked her.

"But I just wanted a glass of water…" the little girl said.

Quickly, Petunia reached for the sink and grabbed a glass, filling it with water from the faucet and handing it to the little girl. "There, now go play outside." Her daughter drank from the glass and placed it on the nearby counter, stepping out of the house resignedly as she looked down – seemed like she knew better than to protest.

From her seat, Mia stared at her late best friend's sister, purposely locking her jaw before she could call the woman some highly unflattering name that would make the conversation end before it had even started. How could she be so cold to her own daughter? she thought. It just didn't seem right to her, though she couldn't really tell if Petunia treatment of the little girl was a mirror of what it usually was or just a momentary thing justified by her not wanting her daughter in contact with 'freaks' like them. Either way, it gave Mia the feeling that she had yet another reason to thank Merlin for willing Harry to be raised by her and not that hateful woman…

The blonde sat on the opposite side of the table, her posture straight as a stick as she folded her hands on her lap, sending them narrow eyed looks. "So? What is it so important that you needed to tell me about? And why hasn't Albus Dumbledore come himself if it was _that _important? He seemed to find trying to dump that… abnormal child on me important enough to come by."

Petunia remembered that night very well: how she and Vernon had heard strange sounds outside the house; how, believing it might be a burglar, her husband had gone downstairs and opened the front-door – shotgun in hand – and seen himself face to face with the headmaster holding the boy with some stern-looking woman by his side; and, finally, how he seemed to have that… demented idea that they would willingly raise her estranged sister's freak of a child – an idea that Vernon had been quick to inflexibly refuse, which she honestly couldn't say she'd disagreed with.

"Don't you _dare_ call that to Harry," Mia replied edgily. "I there was anything abnormal here that night was you being cruel to the point of refusing a home to your baby nephew who'd just seen his parents being murdered."

"He was not my responsibility – I'd never even landed eyes on him before that night!"

"Not for lack of trying from Lily and James's part," Sirius flatly pointed out, sitting back as he watched his wife taking over the argument.

"Yes, they sent you _dozens_ of letters inviting you to come and meet your nephew," Mia accused. "But you ignored them, of course, like you ignored their wedding invitations – Lily kept sending them because she wanted to believe they might have gotten lost in the mail. It certainly was easier to swallow than her sister ignoring them."

"It's none of your business what happened between her and me," Petunia spat.

"It is when it was her shoulder your sister cried on when she saw you really weren't there for her wedding," Sirius replied.

"We were estranged for years – she couldn't expect me to give it a break for a day and go to her wedding," the other woman stated. "She couldn't expect me to take in _her_ son! Vernon and I had Dudley to worry about and all that boy would do was putting us in danger for harbouring him! Accepting to raise a child that's not yours under those conditions… who would do that?"

"_I _did that!" Mia replied angrily. "I was pregnant and alone in a country that wasn't my own and still I took him in. I would have taken him in even if my mother hadn't come to help me raise him and my daughter. So, don't you dare tell me that nobody would do that because, honestly, doing it was one of the _best_ decisions I made in my entire life. And if we're honest here, I guess I should thank you and your husband for being so selfish, after all."

Petunia bit her lower lip but didn't respond. Maybe it was because, deep down, she knew she'd been wrong to abandon her nephew like that. Maybe it was because her ego was badly bruised by Mia's accusations. Not even Petunia herself was sure. Part of her just wanted to throw those people out of her house and her life but another one didn't want to risk doing it before receiving answers to all the questions their visit had brought to her. "You still haven't said why Dumbledore didn't come here himself."

"Because he's dead," Sirius said flatly.

Petunia tensed – if there was a moment when she showed real emotion that was it, though she made quite an effort to hide it. She swallowed hard. "Dead?"

"Murdered," Sirius specified. "By Severus Snape – I believe you're acquainted with him."

"That… awful slimy boy _she_ was friends with?" Petunia said in disgust.

For once, Sirius had to agree with the woman. "That sounds like a pretty fitting description to me," he mumbled.

Petunia's lips pursed, turning into a thin line and she looked down at her hands, which were folded on her lap, her face expressionless.

"Look," Mia said after taking a long, deep breath. "I think it's best for both of us if we just get to the point that brought us here. The sooner we're done with it, the sooner we can leave. For now, at least. We think you may be in danger."

Petunia looked up at her, suspicious. "From what?"

"Voldemort. The bloke who killed your sister and has been haunting Harry all his life," Sirius told her.

Petunia frowned at them, her greenish eyes accusatory. "I thought he was gone. The woman that was with Dumbledore – Mc something… she told us _he _was gone. That the boy had destroyed him when he'd survived the attack. She told _us_."

Mia couldn't help noticing the woman's effort to avoid their names: her sister's and her nephew's. She didn't refer it, though – it wasn't the time or place to pick what might become another fight. In all honesty, she was just looking forward to get out of that house. It gave her chills, thinking of Harry possibly being raised there. Would Petunia have ever made an effort to love him? Treat him with care? She didn't seem to do as much with her own daughter. She shook her head slightly, telling herself in thought to snap out of it and return to the conversation at hand. "He's not that easy to destroy," she said- "He's not like other people now; not completely… mortal. It's a long story."

Sirius nodded. "The point is that our old friend Voldy got a big blow that night when he tried to kill Harry and that put him out of circulation for about a decade but he returned for real a few years ago," he summed up. "You don't think those odd explosions, sudden collapses of new bridges and freak storms you see on the news are really just an unfortunate series of events, do you? That's all him and his followers. You Muggles just have a really fertile imagination when it comes to cover-ups."

Petunia paled a little and swallowed hard. "Alright, so that… Vol-somthing is back. But what does that have to do with me? That's _your_ world's problem and I've made it clear that I don't want _anything _to do with it. I did everything to forget you people… _your kind_ even existed," she said, eyes narrowed. For a moment, she glanced out the kitchen's glass door but was quick to look away as something outside made her cringe inside. "You people have got no business coming back into my life."

"Yes, because Voldemort is really going to care about that when he decides to use you and all your family to get to Harry," Sirius told her sarcastically. "He's killed dozens of Muggles who don't even have any idea there is a Wizarding world out there but, hey, if you want to stay out of it, I'm sure he'll let you. He's well-known for respecting other people's wishes, after all."

She stiffened on her chair. "That's ridiculous. He using us against H… the boy. He's never even seen any of us in his life. Why would anyone use _us_ of all people against him?"

Mia huffed in frustration. "Because you're Muggles and that makes you vulnerable. And because Harry is just good enough of a kid to drop everything in order to go rescue his family – even the one that abandoned him – from harm."

"Oh, and Voldemort knows it, by the way," Sirius added.

Petunia shook her head in denial, even though the reasons Mia had pointed out did make sense in her mind. "No, no, I don't buy it. Such a long stretch… that has to be some sort of scheme from your lot. I haven't landed eyes on any of you for fifteen year and suddenly you people come by, saying my family's in 'danger'. What's next? You want a monthly payment for protection?"

"We want nothing but distance from you, Petunia," Mia said in disgust. "You're sour and self centered and, by Merlin, I have no idea how Lily could even be related to you! And yes, we're offering you protection but if it were just about you, believe me, I wouldn't have even came here. I don't owe you anything, do I? And if it were just about you, I probably wouldn't even care about you betting your life and your family's on some stupid idea that we're pulling a scheme. But I'll be damned if I let you be a liability for my son by doing that!"

There was a moment of silence after Mia's outburst, during which Sirius made a point of shooting her a proud smile, knowing he wouldn't have said it better.

Petunia's face seemed more thoughtful than ever and both could tell those words had gotten to her… "You're really sure they'll try to kill us?"

"You'd be lucky if that was all they did," Sirius told her darkly.

She swallowed hard. "And what sort of protection were you talking about?"

"You go into hiding in a secure location until this war is over," Mia told her stiffly, not looking at her. "Nobody would know you where you were and the Order of the Phoenix – that's a resistance against Voldemort – would be in a charge of protecting you there."

"Hiding? But we have a life here!"

"Yeah, well, if you choose to go on with it, might be that in a few months you won't have a heartbeat," Sirius spat back. "Pretty hard to live like that, don't you figure?"

"But don't you people have a ministry?" Petunia asked. "Why do we have to trust your… order's protection when the ministry may have a better solution? One that won't make us move out, for instance."

"I don't know… maybe because the Minister herself admits that the ministry has most likely been infiltrated and we can't rely on it?" Sirius replied sharply. "But if you want to go to them, be my guest. It's your neck on the line – maybe that will make Harry realize you're just too thick to be helped. You're being offered the best protection there is. Don't be dumb enough to refuse it."

"But… but what do we tell the neighbours?" she asked, still hesitating.

"Whatever you want!" Mia told her, out of patience. Was she seriously more worried about what her neighbours would think than her own survival? "Tell them that your husband has been offered a job in Australia and you're moving there for a while; that your great aunt who lives in Manchester is ill and you're moving there to help her out. Does it really matter, Petunia? If you have to move, than move – at least you'll be alive, which is more than many people can say."

That seemed to settle it as Petunia didn't dare herself to reply with more criticisms or questions. She simply looked down, fumbling with her hands, a look of displeasure on her face, likely at the fact that she had to accept help from 'their lot'. "I can't give you an answer without discussing it with Vernon."

"Well, don't take too long, then," Sirius warned her. "They could come bursting through that door any moment."

That caused the blonde-haired woman to stiffen. "How can I… let you know?" she mumbled.

"Your neighbour Arabella Figg. I believe you're acquainted with her," he said, smiling a little as he saw the other woman pale in shock.

"She's… she's a…"

"She's a squib," Mia told her. "Born to magical parents but not a witch. You can tell her if you accept or not and she'll let us know. And for your own sake, you'd better accept it." With that, she motioned to get up from the table along with Sirius. She really didn't want to stay there any longer than she had to.

"Wait," Petunia said before they had a chance to turn around. She stood up as well before speaking. "A few years ago, I sold my parents' old house. We brought here a few things, some of which used to belong to… to _her_," she said, clearly meaning her sister. In fact, she seemed embarrassed by the admission that she'd kept something that used to belong to Lily, as if it was some sort of betrayal to her own beliefs. "You might as well take it for the boy. It's his right to have it and it's just taking up space in the attic. I was planning to throw it all out, anyway," she was quick to add, trying to sound detached. "Just wait here while I pack it."

She sped out of the kitchen without giving either of them a chance to say anything in return like she feared any comment they might come up with.

Seeing herself alone with Sirius, Mia huffed, exhausted. "I can't figure this woman out. I just can't. She's so… cold most of the time, so _fake_."

Her husband nodded. "But you can just see deep down she still cares about Lily," he added. "And it pisses the heck out of her."

Mia had to agree as she'd noticed it too. "She couldn't even say their names, didn't you notice? Lily's and Harry's," she said. "I'd say there's some guilt related to that."

Sirius sighed, approaching the glass door. "Mrs. Dursley here is one messed up woman," he concluded.

Since Mia chose not to agree or disagree with that statement, he turned his attention to what was going on at the backyard. He was quick to notice the little girl with the strawberry-blonde hair playing out there, kneeling on the floor next to a flowerbed, a big innocent smile on her lips as she touched the flowers. He couldn't help thinking Petunia wouldn't approve or her playing that way seeing she was most likely staining her clothes with dirt from the ground.

And, suddenly, he saw something that led him to believe that wasn't the only reason for Petunia not to approve her daughter's way playing. Because she wasn't just playing like any other Muggle child her age. Most definitely not. As little girl kneeled on the floor next to the flowerbed, the flower she was touching at the moment – a lily, he noted – turned from orange to pink, making her laugh in delight, and then from pink to yellow.

She was a witch, Sirius realized in deep surprise. _Oh, the irony_, he thought.

"Love, stay here, will you? Warn me if you hear Petunia coming back," he told Mia, unable resist opening the glass door and stepping out.

"Sirius, what are you…"he vaguely heard his wife responding as he approached the little girl slowly.

She didn't notice him at all, so entranced she was with her colourful game, until he spoke. "Hey. What are you doing?" he asked her softly.

Hearing the stranger's voice, the little girl looked up at him, her eyes frightened like she knew she was in trouble. "N… nothing. I… Please don't tell Mommy."

He shook his head and gave her a soothing smile. "It's okay. You don't have to hide it from me. Do you have a name?"

There was a moment of silence from both parts during which the little girl observed him closely, though not as thoroughly as her mother had before. "Mommy says I'm not supposed to talk to strangers," the girl finally replied suspiciously.

He nodded. "And you're doing a good job in listening. But, well, let's say that I…" he looked around for a moment to make sure he wasn't being watched and only spotted Mia peaking through the door, a curious look on her face. He gave his wife a nod and turned back to the girl, reaching for his wand and tapping on the flower she'd been playing with, making it turn into a milky white hue with dark pink spots "…have a little bit in common with you."

She looked at him in amazement. "You can do it too?"

He nodded and sat down next to her. "I can. As can many more people in the world – it's sort of a secret from people who can't do it, you know? And you don't have to worry – I won't tell your mother I saw you doing that. You might want to be a bit more careful if you don't want her to see you, though. Does she know you can do this?"

She nodded and looked back at the flower. "Mommy doesn't like me to do those things. I'm not supposed to do them ever: when I'm alone or when I'm with someone. But I like doing them. She calls them a big name: an ab… abom…"

"Abomination?" he asked, feeling a taste of bitterness in his mouth.

The little girl nodded, looking up. "What does it mean? It sounds bad."

"It _is _bad but it also isn't true at all," he assured her. "These things you can do mean you're very special. You don't have to be ashamed of them, no matter what your mother says."

She looked down again. "Mommy says a lot of things. She said once that these things I can do were her punishment for not respecting her 'sacred vows' to God," she told him in a small voice without any malice in it. "I don't know what it means but I don't think Mommy knows I heard it either. She says I'm not supposed to say anything to Daddy or he'll shut me in the dark cupboard under the stairs."

"Did he ever do that to you?" Sirius asked, alarmed.

The youngest Dursley shook her head. "No. And I don't think Daddy would care, though – he doesn't mind me much. He just likes my brother Dudley. Maybe it's because I'm a girl – maybe daddies like boys better."

Sirius shook his head immediately – he pitied that girl, so neglected and misunderstood. Reminded him of himself at that age in a way, though he couldn't say he carried the baggage he suspected that little girl to have, considering hers and Mrs. Figg's words. "Don't let that make you sad. I've got two girls of my own and they're very special to me. Just as special as any boy. Whatever your father thinks of you, it's his problem, not yours."

She turned to him and smiled a little – almost immediately, he could see she had her aunt's smile. In fact, the girl's face overall reminded him more of Lily and her mother, Grace Evans, whom he'd met at his best mate's wedding, than Petunia, leaving out the eyes, which were all hers.

"See? You look much prettier smiling," he told her. "And now you know more about me. Can you tell me your name, then?"

She seemed to consider it for a moment before answering. "Okay. My name is Quinn. Quinn Evans Dursley. It's spelled Q-U-I-N-N, not like the Queen. But the bad kids at school say I'm the Dumb Queen to make fun of me."

"Well, they're the dumb ones if they don't even know how to spell your name," Sirius replied. "And since I know your name now, I should say that it's nice to meet you, Quinn. My name is Sirius Black."

Quinn giggled. "That's a funny name."

He chuckled. "A little, I guess. It's a good thing, though – it will help you not forgetting it. It's important you don't."

"Why not?"

"Because in a few years, when you turn eleven, an owl will deliver a letter for you. A letter from a school for special boys and girls like you," he told her.

"I won't be eleven for another…" she paused, using her fingers to count "…four years and two months," she declared. "It's a looong time."

"That's gonna pass in a flash, you'll see," he promised. "Now listen: maybe someone will come by to explain about that school to your parents, maybe not. The thing is that maybe they won't like it and if they don't, they may want to keep you away from it. But if that happens, I want you to do something: get a piece of paper and write to me about it. Then, either give the letter to Mrs. Figgs and ask her to send it to me or…"

"Mrs. Figg, the lady with all the funny cats?" Quinn inquired.

Sirius nodded, chuckling. "Yes, the lady with all the funny cats. But if she's not around anymore when the letter from the school comes, just put the note to me in an envelope and write my name on it – don't worry about an address or stamps. Just write my name on the envelope and put it in the mailbox." It was a known fact within the wizarding community that there were wizards with the job of locating correspondence sent to another wizard by muggle means and make sure they got it. "I promise that when I receive it, I'll try to come by and have a word with them – make sure they send you to that school."

"Why do I have to go there?"

"Because that's where you'll learn everything that being special lets you do. And that's where people will really understand you."

"How do you know that?" she asked. "Can you see the future too?"

He smiled and shook his head. "I wish. Let's just say that once upon a time I had a difficult family too and that going to Hogwarts was one of the best things that happened to me. Now, do you think you can remember my name?"

The little blonde nodded. "It's Mr. Sirius Black. But can I ask you something else?"

"Sure you can."

"Why am I like this? Special? My _whole_ family is normal…"

Sirius shrugged. "Who knows?" How could he explain it to her? Something told him he shouldn't give a name to what they were. Witches and Wizards. It ought to be confusing for a girl her age that didn't live among magical people. And he could guess that if Quinn ever said to someone 'hey, I'm a witch', she might get into trouble. "Sometimes people like us are born in regular families just like that," he told her. "I can tell you a little secret about your family, though." He pointed at the flower she'd been playing with. "Do you know what type of flower that is?"

Quinn shook her head. "It's one of Mommy's special flowers. She always takes care of them better than the others. I dunno what they're called, though."

"They're lilies," he said. And, he thought, it couldn't be a coincidence that Petunia like the flowers her sister was named after better than all others. She really was a hard one to figure out… "Do you know anyone with a name that sounds like that?"

This time, she nodded. "Mommy's sister was called Lily. Dudley told me once about her when he was helping me fill my family tree. He said she died a long time ago."

Sirius nodded sadly in return. "I know – I knew her. She was my best mate's girl. And you know what? She was special like you too."

"She could make flowers change to other colours too?" the little girl asked.

"She could make flowers grow out of nothing," he told her.

"Wow," she mumbled, her eyes shining in fascination. "I'll be able to do that too?"

He shrugged. "Someday, probably. But in the meanwhile you've got to be careful so people won't see you doing those things. Some people wouldn't understand – that's why we keep it a secret from them."

She nodded, looking down. "They'll think it's bad like Mommy does."

"They might," he agreed.

"Dudley doesn't think it's bad. He thinks it's weird but he doesn't get angry when he sees me doing those special things. He promised he wouldn't tell Mommy or Daddy he saw me 'cause I asked him not to."

Sirius raised his eyebrows. Dudley must be her brother. And, oddly, Quinn's description of his reaction to her abilities was not at all what he would have imagined, considering who his mother was and Arabella Figg's account of his personality. "Is your brother nice to you?"

Quinn nodded. "He was mean before and called me a silly baby in front of his friends but then he started being nicer to me. He says I'm the only one at home who listens to him now. That's 'cause he's angry at Mommy and Daddy – they want him to go to a fancy school in London to study numbers and then sell drills like Daddy does. But he says he wants to be a policeman."

"A policeman? Why?" Sirius asked. Those were the Muggle equivalent to Aurors, he recalled. A mean bully turned out law-enforcement-agent-wannabe. That was ironic too, he thought. Irony seemed to be a strong trait in that family.

"'Cause then he gets to kick bad guys' backsides," Quinn stated, giggling. "He didn't call them 'backsides' but that's what he told me. Daddy says he's being dumb but Dudley says Daddy's the dumb one if he thinks he's gonna spend his life selling drills like him."

Sirius snorted. Well, maybe Dudley Dursley was not that bad, after all, he thought. Before he could say anything else, he heard tapping on the kitchen door and turned to it. Mia was standing by it, signalling for him to hurry back inside.

"Guess that's my cue to leave," he announced, motioning to get up. Mia must have heard something that made her believe Petunia must be coming back and he had a feeling that if she saw him talking to her daughter, Quinn would get in trouble. "It was nice to meet you, Quinn. Remember that you're a very special girl."

The little girl smiled like he's just told her the best thing in the world.

He started to walk away but stopped midway to the door, turning around for a moment. "Oh, and what we talked about… it's our secret, okay?"

She put her index finger in front of her lips. "It's our secret," she agreed before he turned around and walked back into the kitchen.

He closed the door behind him and sat back at the table next to Mia, who shot him a nervous inquisitive look only seconds before Petunia walked into the room carrying a large cardboard box, which she placed on the kitchen table.

"There," she said stiffly. "I put everything I could find in this box."

Sirius got up again and picked up the box. "Thanks," he said. "Oh, and Petunia, I look forward to see your daughter at Hogwarts in a few years."

The woman's eyes widened and she stood frozen. "How…?"

"Oh, she didn't do anything that gave her away. Us _freaks_ can just feel each other," he lied smoothly as Mia stared at him, surprised at what he meant, before glancing out the window at the little girl. "I knew it as soon as I saw her."

"You people can't take Quinn away too. You can't take her like you took Lily," Petunia told him, fearful as she spoke her sister's name for the first time.

The protectiveness in Petunia's voice surprised Mia but, in a way, made her start to understand the woman's feelings towards her daughter: she loved the little girl at the same time she resented her for what she was. A witch. And she also feared that she might lose her for that same reason. Except she was getting it all wrong… "No one took Lily away from you," Mia stated. "You're the one who pushed her away because you were jealous. And if you still love your sister… if you love your daughter too, put that jealousy aside and do a better job being a mother to her than you did being a sister to Lily. Goodbye, Petunia."

With that, both Sirius and Mia made their way out of the kitchen and into the hall at the same time Vernon Dursley stepped into the house. The only description of him that Sirius could come up with would be a huge bloke (in a beefy sort of way) with a comically purple face like he was constantly in a bad mood and a furry moustache in it. Unlike his wife, he lacked in terms of neck since his double chin covered it.

The man scowled as soon as he saw them in there like he could just tell they weren't regular guests. "Who are you?" he asked sharply.

"They're _her_ friends," Petunia told her husband.

He looked unconvinced. "Aren't they a bit too old to be the girl's friends? She's four," he said, nodding at little Quinn, who'd just entered the house again.

"I'm almost seven," she said, upset Vernon hadn't gotten her age right.

Vernon ignored the little girl as Petunia spoke. "Not _her_ friends. I meant… Lily's."

He looked at his wife sharply. "The odd kind?"

Sirius responded insted. "That's right. We're the ones who play with wands and turn people into frogs," he told him, grinning. "We were just leaving, though, so maybe another time…"

Vernon narrowed his eyes at him. "Oi, don't I know you?"

_Not likely,_ Sirius thought. He'd recall such an unpleasant character if he'd met him. Unless he hadn't really… "You might," he stated. "My picture showed a lot in Muggle and Wizard the papers a few years back – might have popped in your telly news too," Sirius told him before turning to Mia. "Remember, love? Back when I was on the run from prison. That whole business about me allegedly killing seven people with one curse."

Mia nodded. "Yes, there was a whole lot of fuss about that."

Sirius turned back to Vernon, who looked awfully pale by then. "Don't worry, mate. The official version now is that it was all a mix-up." He turned to little Quinn and gave her a grin and a wink. She covered her mouth with her hand to avoid a giggle as she understood he wasn't talking seriously about the killing part and just scaring her father.

Feeling like he ought to bother the guy a little further, Sirius reached for his pocket with difficulty due to the box with Lily's things he was carrying and grabbed his wand – he could just see Vernon sweating as he looked at it with beady eyes. Then, he pointed it at the large box and used a reducing charm to turn it into a much smaller size so he could put it in his pocket. "Much better," he said before pointing at the door. "Do you mind? We were just leaving."

Vernon stepped away from the door with a jump and practically held his breath up until Sirius was out. Mia stopped on her way, though.

"Oh, and Petunia, we'll be waiting for an answer," Mia reminded her before Petunia nodded quietly in return.

Outside, neither Sirius nor Mia spoke until they were several yards away from the house, definitely out of earshot. "You didn't need to scare him like that, you know?" Mia told her husband. "Vernon, I mean."

He shook his head. "It's a matter of principle. Any decent marauser has the duty to give a hard time to an arse like that."

His wife rolled her eyes. "I'll take your word for it." She sighed, then. "And how did you know the little girl was a witch?" she inquired.

"I saw her changing the colours of a flower through the window," he told his wife. "The kid is gonna be talented. She's pretty talkative once she gets past that initial shyness. Her name is Quinn."

Mia smiled. "That's Lily and Petunia's mother's maiden name," she recalled. "Lily told me she wanted to use it as a middle name if she ever had a girl."

"Guess her niece got it as a first name instead," Sirius pointed out, sighint. "That kid is only six and already has got some serious baggage to carry."

Mia nodded. "Yes, the way Petunia resents her for being the way she is… it ought to be confusing for a little girl her age."

"Oh, I don't think it's just that…" Sirius stated. "Remember what Figg told us about Petunia's… _side dish_ and then something that it led to?"

His wife stopped walking and raised her eyebrows at him. "You're not saying… Oh, she might just be gossiping. That guy who was at her house could just be a family friend…"

"Oh, really? And what if I told you that Quinn mentioned she once heard her mother say that her being a witch was her punishment for breaking her 'sacred vows to God', which could really be interpreted as her marriage vows?" he said.

Mia was silent for a few seconds. "So you think her daughter may not be Vernon's," she deduced.

He nodded. "I'm pretty sure that's the case. I mean, I'm living proof that one doesn't have to take after his or her family but that girl is just _too_ nice to be Dursley's. And he completely ignores the kid – probably even knows she's not his and just stayed with Petunia anyway because of appearances. Maybe even has a bunch of _side dishes_ himself."

She rolled her eyes and resumed walking. "Merlin, Sirius, now you're just making up a story. That's awful. Sounds like something straight out of a bad drama full of intrigues."

"Hey, you heard what Figg said, not to mention you saw how cold they ware to each other," he pointed out. "There had to be a story behind it."

"If there was, it's none of our business," she told him, sighing.

He put one arm around her waist. "I'm just saying that not everyone is as lucky as we are."

Mia had to agree with that. "It would be awful if we ever became like that."

Sirius cringed. "Tell you what, love: you've got a free pass to smother me in my sleep if I ever become an arse as big as Dursley to you. How's that for you?"

"A lifetime in Azkaban," she replied dryly.

"Sure. But you wouldn't be alone since I'd make sure I'd haunt you for all eternity," he pointed out.

"Oh, how nice of you. That would certainly improve things for me," she mockingly assured him before making an effort to turn serious again. "But really, do you think they'll accept the Order's protection?"

He nodded. "They'll probably be a pain to whoever is assigned to protect them but in the end they won't want to risk getting killed for staying behind. I'd bet anything they'll accept it."

"I hope you're right," she confessed. "For Harry's sake."

Sirius nodded. "Yeah, for Harry's sake. Now let's go home, love. This place gives me shivers."

**A/N: Sorry for the delay. As I had warned in last chapter's A/N, I had a field trip this week. And rained. A lot. Rain led to mud, mud let to someone (me!) slipping on the floor and slipping on the floor led to six hours in the hospital waiting for someone to do something about my sprained ankle (I must have broken a mirror lately because my luck is not so great these days...). That said, here's a slightly painkiller-induced chapter. I hope you liked it because I sure liked to write it (this the size). **

**Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	32. Memories

**A/N: It's big... no more comments.**

Thinking back, Sirius mused as he stood in the Quidditch pitch watching a bunch of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff first-years fly around on school brooms tossing around a few quaffles, it had been a pretty busy week. A very crappy one, actually, when one counted Dumbledore's death, Harry and Ginny's need to plot a fake breakup and their heavily unpleasant visit to the Dursleys a couple of days before. At least, he had to admit, he'd gotten to meet little Quinn, which had been pretty great. He could only hope the kid wouldn't be completely messed up because of her parents' asinine behaviour towards her.

Lately, he'd found himself thinking of the little girl from time to time, especially since Petunia still hadn't given a response to their protection proposal…. And if she didn't respond soon or decided, for some completely stupid reason, to refuse, he wouldn't think twice before showing up in Privet Drive again and maybe even persuade her and her oaf of a husband to rethink their position using not-so-nice ways for that purpose. Not unforgivables – no, not those since Merlin knew they disgusted him almost as much as those who used them. But he wouldn't put a little blackmail behind him – he wondered what Petunia would say if he shared with her that little theory he had concerning young Quinn's parentage. He wondered what she would say if he promised to spread the rumour among her neighbours like a spattergroit outburst.

Honestly, it wasn't that he really cared if Petunia and Vernon were protected or not (except he was aware they should, for Harry's sake) but he wouldn't let them endanger that little girl's life over their hatred of magic. It only seemed right he'd step up for Quinn when he could so well relate to a crappy life under the roof of a crappy pair of parents.

Sighing, he made an effort to clear his mind of the distracting thoughts and turned his attention back to the first years. Checking his wrist-watch, he noted it was still thirty minutes before the class was to finish. That was actually his last class of the year with that half of the first years.

While initially it had been planned that the school-year would last other two-weeks, until the last week of June, the end of it had been anticipated by a week at the parents' insistence. And, although they had insisted on more than a week of anticipation, that had been all they'd managed to get out of McGonagall. Things were bad for Hogwarts: several students had been pulled from the school already and Sirius could only imagine how many wouldn't be coming back in the following year…

He shook his head, noting his thoughts kept driving him away and figured that if he spent the next half-hour of the class drifting away from it, some kid might end up doing something stupid without him noticing and get hurt. All things considered, maybe finishing it early and giving them those extra minutes to enjoy the great near-summer day on their own might be a good idea.

"Alright, troop, feet back on the ground," he shouted at all the kids. "I'm setting you free earlier."

There were cheers from some, mainly the least successful in the class, and groans from most of the flight enthusiasts – maybe he'd make up to the latter ones and let them fly a little another day if they wanted to.

He cleared his throat before speaking to the group of young kids in front of him and warning them against trying too complicated stuff with their brooms over the summer at the risk of breaking their necks – "_Your house-teams might use you next year or the other and it would be a shame if you weren't… available._" –, he declared the last flying class of the year over and told the kids to scram.

Then, with all of them gone, Sirius started his usual post-class routine involving stocking the Quaffles and the broomsticks back in their respective supplies closets, which kept him busy enough not to notice that a few minutes later he wasn't alone in the pitch anymore.

"Hi, Daddy," he heard his oldest daughter's voice saying behind him before he turned to see her approach as she gave him a smile.

He grinned back at her. "Hello, Izzybel. What do I owe the honour of your visit? Weren't you supposed to be in class or something?"

She shook her head. "Free period. As of this week at least. Now it was supposed to be a DADA class actually but, well, you know what happened…"

Sirius nodded, understanding what she meant. After Snape had killed Dumbledore and escaped last weekend, McGonagall hadn't bothered to replace him since all exams had been already taken and there was little time of classes ahead of them until the end of the school year, thus turning all of the class-slots initially occupied by DADA into free periods.

"So you decided to pay a visit to your beloved father," Sirius told his daughter, reaching for his heart in a fake sentimental fashion. "That's sweet, love."

"Only because I was," she declared as she approached him. "I was actually doing a transfiguration assignment with Luna near here – she insisted that doing it outside under the sun would stimulate out intellect or something of that sort – and then when we were finished she went to feed the Thestrals. I had to pass that since it's a bit… odd watching food being eaten by creatures I can't actually see. Then, I saw the first years coming from this way, which made me figure you'd be here and I'd pay you a visit."

"Well, I'd say you figured well," he told her, wrapping an arm around her when she reached him. "We haven't had much time to talk lately, have we, Izzy?"

She shook her head. "It's been a rough week. In understand."

He nodded solemnly. "Tell you what, help me finish putting away this equipment and I'm all yours for the next twenty or so minutes."

"Hum, twenty minutes putting up with you… too long," she joked.

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "Little brat, aren't you?"

She laughed but actually reached for a couple of broomsticks lying on the floor to help her father. They worked quickly as a team as, barely five minutes later, both were already sitting on the third row of the empty Quidditch Pitch's bleachers.

"So, how's your little act going these days?" he asked his daughter.

There was a story behind that question, obviously. After Harry and Ginny's fake breakup a few things had needed to be settled to make the whole thing believable. One of them had been deciding how their common friends who knew about the truth – Ron, Hermione and Izzy – would react to the alleged split up. While Hermione was to remain strictly neutral through the whole thing in her usual diplomatic fashion, Ron was supposed to give both Harry and Ginny a cold shoulder for a few days (as to let everyone believe he was conflicted between which side to take) before resuming his usual interaction with both while avoiding the fact that there had been a relationship to begin with. Izzy was another story, though – she was to play the faithfully protective friend taking Ginny's side against her 'bastard of an ex-boyfriend', never mind he was as good as her brother.

Izzy grinned. "Awfully fun. Mostly I've got to give Harry silent treatment and cold glares but it's worth it when I get to call him a jerk or an idiot – to his face, half the time. You should see him when I do it sometimes – it's like he's just wondering if I'm enjoying this."

"Which you are, obviously," Sirius said, chuckling. "I'll admit it's an accurate reaction, though: you girls can be feral when you stick together against a bloke. So, I take it everyone is believing it?"

"I think Luna is a bit suspicious," Izzy pointed out. "She just… knows things sometimes. About what people feel and hide. She wouldn't tell anyone, though. But aside from her, practically everyone's fallen for it. McLaggen even asked Ginny out yesterday in front of everyone in the Common Room."

Sirius gave her a disbelieving look. "Are you kidding? She's barely been 'single' for four days. That's just… bad. What did Harry say?"

"Nothing, really, or he'd ruin the whole act," she told him. "He looked capable of stabbing that git to death with the quill he was holding, though. Hard to believe even McLaggen is that thick. Ginny refused it, obviously and called him an insensitive prick for hitting on her 'so soon after her longest-term relationship had ended'. Do you want to know what he did next?"

"Sulked for the rest of the day?"

"He waited for her to storm out and then pulled me aside to ask _me _out."

Sirius's eyes narrowed to slits. "The nerve of that little bastard…"

For once, Izzy couldn't bring herself for scolding her father over insulting a boy for asking her out, mostly because she'd done the same herself. "Needless to say I refused it too. He seemed to be pretty set on getting a date, though, since he asked Hermione afterwards and then Lavender too."

"Oh, that's just…" He'd had his way with girls and had never dropped _that_ low or even considered to do so. "Well, all I can say is that you and Ginny – and Hermione too, I have to assume – couldn't have made a better choice when you told that dimwit to go lump it."

"Well, Lavender can't say the same…" Izzy mumbled

Sirius shrugged. "Where's our favourite redhead, anyway? You said you were just studying with Luna earlier but you and Ginny have been attached at the hip lately…"

"Oh, she just needed some time alone to wallow," she told her father, who seemed confused. "Or at least that's what she's letting everyone believe."

He grinned, then. "Meeting young Harry somewhere, isn't she? I know he had a free period too."

Izzy nodded. "That's right. They're taking turns at using the invisibility cloak to sneak around. This is Ginny's turn – she's meeting him at the boathouse now."

"Hum, the boathouse. Nice place. A bit wet for my taste but still nice," he commented. "Tends to be occupied, though."

She shook her head. "Not today. Hermione got the idea of spreading the rumour that someone had blown three pounds' worth of dung-bombs in there yesterday so nobody would feel tempted to show up there and run straight into them. If anyone's brave enough to try and get there, there are still a bunch of alarm charms set to warn Harry and Ginny that someone is coming."

"Merlin, you people cover all basis, don't you?"

"We can be pretty efficient with plans when we want to," she said proudly.

That made Sirius recall something. "Speaking of plans, there's something I've been meaning to ask you for a while. How the hell did you get your hands on so much Felix Felicis?"

"Oh…" she mumbled. "Well, we sort of stole it from Slughorn's stash."

Sirius looked surprised. "Slughorn's actual stash? The one with all the weird codes?"

"You've been to Slughorn's stash before?"

"Well, yeah," he declared like it was obvious. "I was a Marauder and he was our teacher with all those really great potions stashed in his office. Just put two and two together."

"You tried to get your hands on the potions," she guessed.

"Bingo. We never managed to get through the codes, though, and weren't about to feed someone a potion that could easily be some sort of poison," her father told her. "How did you figure out which was the Felix?"

"We were lucky," Izzy said. "Slughorn was labelling a few vials just before we got into his office and we managed to decode what his codes meant. Honestly, I doubt we would have made it if Ginny and Hermione hadn't taken Harry's Felix Felicis before we tried to steal the rest."

"Wait, Hermione helped you steal it?" Sirius asked in disbelief.

"It was a life or death situation," Izzy pointed out. "I suppose that puts it in moral grey area even for Hermione…"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Well, has Slughorn noted the potion was missing?"

"I don't think so but if he ever does, he can't really blame us for using it to help our side in a battle. Slughorn can be a bit annoying sometimes but he's a good guy at the end of the day," she said.

Her father shrugged. "I suppose he's not bad. Well, look, maybe this comes a bit late but I think you should know that what you guys did for us during the battle was pretty amazing. The Felix, trying to help holding the lines… even the Order is impressed. But try not to let this jumping-into-a-battle thing become a habit or else you'll scare the living daylights out of your mom and me. We can only take so many scares a lifetime…"

Izzy sighed. "The most I can do is promise that I'll try – the DA wasn't just something we did to spend time, Dad, and if my friends need me to fight for them, that's what I'll do."

He wanted to ask her not to, to just stay behind, safe, but he knew that would be hypocrite at the very least – after all, _he _wouldn't stay behind. If he had already acknowledged all the roughness, the difficulties that were ahead of Harry and accepted that he was grown enough to fight them, he couldn't deny the fact that his daughter had grown up into a fighter too. It was a matter of survival now. "I supposed that will have to do," he accepted.

She nodded and then made an effort to change the topic of the conversation. "So, where's Mom anyway? I usually run into her in the hallways between classes but I haven't seen her all morning."

"Well, that's because she's elbow-deep in exams to grade. The classes are ending next week and the students need to leave knowing their grades, so she needs to deliver them to McGonagall next Wednesday at the latest." he said, groaning. "Guess no one will be seeing much of her until then. Don't take it personally."

"Oh, well, at least the ministry is in charge of the OWLs and NEWTs," Izzy pointed out. "That makes it about less a hundred for her to worry about."

"She'd pull her own hair with the stress if that wasn't the case. Thank Merlin _I_ don't have to worry about exams in my job description – can you imagine me sitting at a desk grading a pile of tests?"

"Definitely not. In fact, if you did have any sort of test-grading thing to worry about, you probably would just pay Moony to do it for you."

Sirius looked thoughtful for a moment before nodding. "Yeah, that wouldn't be such a bad idea," he recognized. Moony had always been the one to handle the bureaucracy with that endless patience of his. What were friends like him for?

"_Well, well, well, brother, look what we've found here. Two Blacks for the price of one_," they heard an all-too-familiar voice saying from a distance – they didn't even need to look to be sure it was one of the twins speaking. And where one was, the other ought to be close, which was just the case.

The two red-heads with strictly identical features and grins approached their seats in a strolling pace like they were just taking a walk. Seemed like an odd coincidence that just when he'd been thinking of Remus, his bosses appeared out of thin air, so to speak, Sirius thought.

"And what are you two doing here?" he asked as the two sat down on the row of seats below theirs. "Decided skipping your NEWTs wasn't such a good idea? Well, you're sort of a little too late if you want to take them now."

One of the twins made a face at that, which denied it on its own. "NEWTs." He felt himself shivering at the very thought. "We'd rather eat a pound of doxy eggs each that putting ourselves through those, wouldn't we, Fred?"

"Make that half," his twin suggested. "I heard McLaggen ate a pound of them last year and spent a week in the Hospital Wing puking everything he ate for the first three days. NEWTs seem a bit mild in comparison."

Sirius snorted and turned to his daughter. "Once again, I have to refer that you've made a wise choice when you refused to go out with that… young man."

George raised his eyebrows, froning. "That git McLaggen asked you out?"

Izzy rolled her eyes. "Me and Ginny and Hermione again – those doxy eggs must have messed up his brains if he actually thought she'd give him another chance after that god-awful date last Christmas – and then Lavender, who actually said 'yes'. Not sure which one I should feel sorrier for," she admitted. "Maybe Seamus Finnigan since he actually likes her and was planning to ask her out himself from what Neville told me."

"Finnigan's a good bloke but he's always had a questionable sense of taste," Fred commented, shaking his head pitifully. "Maybe Lav-Lav going out with McLaggen was for the best."

"Maybe. But you still haven't told us what you're doing here at Hogwarts," Izzy pointed out.

"Suspicious, aren't you, Isabelle?" George asked. "You wouldn't believe us if we told you we'd came by just for the pleasure of your company, which we're so fond of, would you?"

"Not for one second," she told him easily.

He reached for his heart. "Oh, the lack of faith… it kills me."

"We're actually here in Order Business," Fred stated.

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Order business?"

"Yes. Hogwarts watch, remember?" he stated. "Mad-Eye suggested at the meeting last Monday that there should always be at least an extra member of the Order at Hogwarts, ready to intervene in case something weird or suspicious happened. You actually don't remember that part?"

"Probably dozed through it or something," he mumbled. "Honestly, it's hard to keep my attention in what Mad-Eye says through an Order meeting after he always starts up with a bloody lecture. At some point it just starts to sound like _blah, blah, grave danger, blah, blah, constant vigilance…_ After a while it's just white noise until someone else speaks."

"Well," George started, "Mad-Eye was supposed to be the one coming today but we heard Dad saying yesterday that he wouldn't be able to make it 'cause old Dung Fletcher, the little bastard, has been selling bogus protection charms at Diagon Alley again and Mad-Eye is the only one who can keep him in line."

"The only one who scares him enough, at least," Fred added. "So, we very _selflessly_ offered to cover for him since today is our weekly day of rest."

"I thought Mondays were your weekly day of rest. Today is a Friday," Izzy stated.

"All the same," Fred told her. "Our bosses are pretty great blokes."

"They definitely have a soft spot for us – let us close the shop whenever we want to, pay us tones," George added jokingly. "Plus, Fridays are the quietest days of business at the shop, according to Remus's statistics."

"Good old Moony does _statistics_ now?" Sirius asked with a laugh.

"And charts too," Fred informed them. "I didn't even know there was a charm for that stuff but apparently… unless he does them by hand, which would have to mean Tonks isn't keeping him occupied enough these days."

"Doubt it," his twin mumbled, chuckling. "But leaving his charts aside, since we were around and all seems to be fine here at Hogwarts, we figured we'd swing by the pitch for old times' sake."

"Hoping to get your hands on a broom, a beater's bat and a bludger too, maybe?" Sirius suggested, grinning. "Well, in about…" he checked his watch "… ten minutes I'll be off to the Great Hall having lunch and maybe the supplies closet will conveniently be left unlocked – my mind's not the same as it used to be. I can only hope that if someone gets their hands on the supplies, they'll make an effort not to be seen and to not destroy them."

"So noted," Fred replied, his expression already plotting.

"Anyway," George said. "We'd been hoping to spend a little time with Gin-Gin too. We had a few prank-related plans for her to use on young Harry."

There was a pause after that statement, during which Izzy and Sirius simply stared at both twins with uncomfortable looks on their faces. "Hum… guys," Sirius started said hesitantly. "I'm feeling a bit awkward here but… didn't anyone tell you that…?"

"That the breakup is as real as Rita Skeeter's stories?" Fred asked. "Sure they did. Better liars than we gave them credit for, hum, George?"

"Much better," he agreed.

Sirius looked at them sceptically. "Alright, as much as I'm all for pranking, which you're very well-aware of, I've got to ask: you want Ginny to prank my godson because…"

"Simple," George stated. "As it happens, we have a very deep belief that any breakup involving Ginny slapping a bloke in public would have to be bad enough to send her in a vindictive rampage. One ought to keep appearances and make it happen."

"Oh, that's bogus and you know it," Izzy accused. "You two just want to prank somebody."

His look of revolt was mirrored by his brother. "We most certainly… _do_," Fred stated in an appalled tone that clearly didn't match the admission. "So, where's Ginny, after all?"

"Around," she said vaguely.

George narrowed his eyes. "Around being where exactly?"

Izzy's eyes narrowed in return. "_None of your business street_. That would be near _Stop asking questions road_."

"Hum, hostile," Fred told his twin, thoughtfully. "No doubt she knows where Ginny is and doesn't want to share."

"And if she doesn't want to share, it means Ginny mustn't want it shared either," George agreed as the two of them observed Izzy like she was some sort of lab rat. "Well, now I'm even more curious. We can get it out of her, don't you think?"

"As easily as me getting a snog out of Angelina," Fred agreed.

"Oh, okay, talk about me like I'm not sitting right here. That's nice," Izzy mumbled in annoyance as they kept staring at her very quietly like they could see right through her. At some point, she got a bit freaked out by their stares, considering Fred and George were mad geniuses of sorts under their constantly festive outside layer. "What are you doing?" Faced with no response, she turned to her father and gripped his arm nervously. "Daddy, what are they doing?"

Sirius shrugged. "I have no idea," he said, half-grinning as he patted her hand absently. "But I really want to find out. Just sit tight and let them do their thing, love."

"But…"

"Think I got it," Fred said suddenly, the staring finished and a plotting look back on his face as he scratched his chin. "Ginny's somewhere sneaking around with Harry, hum?"

This time, Izzy was the one staring – if one knew about Harry and Ginny's arrangement, it wouldn't be so hard to reach that conclusion but doing it so quickly and after acting all weird was just… plain bizarre. "What…? How…?"

"Easy," George said. "If you don't want us to know about Ginny's whereabouts, that has to mean she's doing something you don't think she'd want us to stick our butts into. Seeing as we're probably the most liberal people you'll know what it comes to rule-breaking…"

Sirius cleared his throat, a bit offended at his words.

"… barring your Dad, of course," the redhead added quickly, "it had to be something that we'd find just perfect to use against her as mocking material."

"Such as walking in on her snogging a black-haired git with a well-know scar on his forehead," Fred finished. "Too bad for her that that is exactly what we're planning to do. Only thing we need to find out is where she is."

"Which I'm not telling you," Izzy said, determined.

"We'll give you endless credit in our shop if you change your mind," George offered.

"Tempting," Sirius mumbled to his daughter. "But not worth ratting your best friend over. Ginny's got a mean bat-bogey hex and she'd not afraid to use it on you."

Izzy nodded. "Forget it," she told the twins.

"Come on. A little hint of where she is won't hurt anyone. We even already know it's no use looking inside the castle," Fred said, trying to keep the conniving tone from his voice.

She shrugged. "Still plenty of ground for you to cover out he…" She paused suddenly. "Wait a minute, how do you know they're not inside the castle?"

"We didn't," George said casually as he grinned in triumph. "Now we do. That clears about half the places we had in mind."

"Damn it!" she cursed at herself under her breath.

"Genius," Sirius said, chuckling, which had his daughter giving him an annoyed look. "What? I'm just saying… I wouldn't have thought of that myself."

"So, out here where would a pair of lovebirds go to fool around?" Fred wondered, once again, acting like he and George were the only ones there. "Hagrid's Hut?"

George shook his head. "It's still damaged from the battle. It was set on fire, remember?"

"Right… The Greenhouses, then?"

"Too much carnivorous plants around. Gin-Gin wouldn't want Harry to lose a chunk of his skinny arse over a snog."

"Alright. Then how about the owlery?"

"Too dirty," Sirius told them. "It's just impossible to snog in peace without ending up with own poop all over. Believe me, I know."

"Daddy!" Izzy said in disbelief, startling her father. "You're on our side. You're not supposed to help them!"

"Oh, sorry," he mumbled apologetically, turning to the twins. "Feel free to go on."

Fred shrugged then. "I can't think of where else. One of the courtyards would be too public. I guess that leaves… what? The Forest, some supply closet here at the pitch or the boathouse."

Izzy tried to hide a finch when she heard the redhead saying the last location but was unsuccessful, since George clearly caught it.

"Jackpot! Boathouse it is," he said with a grin.

"Wait a minute," she protested. "I didn't…"

"Might as well have with that flinch," George replied before turning to Sirius. "One would think your daughter would have a much better poker face, Marauder genes and all."

Sirius sighed. "Takes after her mother. Mia was always very honest." He clicked his tongue and shook his head in a disapproving fashion.

"Well, looks like we've got irritation to cause somewhere else," Fred said, getting up from his seat.

George nodded solemnly. "Indeed, brother, indeed," he said as he got up too. Then, he turned to Izzy and winked. "A pleasure getting information from you, Iz."

"More like stealing it!" she shouted as the two walked away from them, annoyingly triumphant. She looked at her father, then, and huffed. "Sometimes I just can't believe those two."

Sirius snorted. "If they'd been born twenty or so years earlier, there would have been six Marauders instead of four."

"Hey, you're not helping! They've just tricked me into giving away my best friend," she complained. "She's gonna kill me"

He chuckled and wrapped one arm around his daughter, kissing the top of her head. "Don't worry, love. I'll serve as a witness that you tried as hard as you could to keep yourself from spilling the beans. They were just too good for you." He stood up and offered her a hand. "Now, how about you let your wonderful Dad walk you to the Great Hall for lunch? I'm hoping your mom will be out of her deep-exam-grading mode by now or else I'll have to intervene with force."

Izzy chuckled as she took his hand. "Yeah, _I _would like to see that."

* * *

**Boathouse – ****several minutes earlier**

Even though it was colder in there than on the outside and the air smelled of water, the boathouse had always been a popular place for people to come and snog every now and then. It was one of those Hogwarts customary things like crossing the lake towards the school on a boat when entering it for the first year, laughing through at least three jokes from the talking statue of a hog on the sixth floor to get luck for an exam or simply avoiding Filch.

Other thing about the boathouse was that it tended to offer quite a dose of privacy, being far away from everywhere else, as long as nobody was planning to use it as a snog-spot. And thanks to Hermione's dungbomb rumour it was likely the most avoided place in the whole school, leaving it all for Harry and Ginny alone.

Yet, unlike their friends' beliefs, snogging hadn't been what had brought them there. Mostly, at least.

"Do you need me to do it for you?" Ginny asked, looking at the shrunken cardboard box resting on the wooden floor between them as they sat in an attic area of the boathouse, side by side with a bunch of hoisted up boats almost touching the battered ceiling. "Change the box back to its normal size, I mean."

"No, I can do it," he said, his eyes fixed on the little box. "I just need…"

"Another moment?" his girlfriend asked, receiving a nod in return.

The decision of opening the box Petunia had sent to him with Ginny had been pretty much automatic when Sirius had given it to him in the previous day. He could easily do it alone – that was a fact. After all, it was just a box with things that had belonged to his mom, not a creature for him to wrestle. But all the memories contained in it, he was sure, would bring feelings. A hurricane of them. And having Ginny around always made it easier for him to deal with feelings of all sorts. Merlin knew he could really use 'easy' these days.

"Harry, if you want to talk before opening it, I'm here to listen," she said softly, reaching for his hand.

He shook his head. "It's okay, it's just… the memories that must be in this box. From my mom. Aunt Mia always told me all she could and gave me all she had from my parents and, don't take me wrong, it's great to learn anything about them but in the end, after I meddle though the memories of them, it always feels like something is missing from it all. I get to see, hear memories about them… but they're never really mine, are they? I was never there to witness them."

Ginny was a quiet for a few moment. Her parents had always been right there with her – making memories hadn't been a problem at all, sometimes even a bother than they were around _all the time_. Thinking back, it made her feel a bit bad in comparison. Harry hadn't been alone – that was a fact. He'd had Mia and then Sirius. He'd had Izzy and Lulu too. A family. But she could understand that there must be a call for his own blood, to know the parents who'd made him, loved him and died for him. She stood up and moved from sitting opposite him to sitting right by his side – she had a feeling he could use the closeness, after all. "Don't you remember anything at all about them? You know, from when you were very little?"

"I remember the things the Dementors made me see," Harry informed her.

_Might as well not,_ Ginny thought. Watching his own mother being killed, his father sacrificing for both… that was just… unimaginable. "That's all?"

"I… there are a few other things. I'm not sure if they're memories or just… dreams or ztuff I made up in my head," he said, looking down.

"Tell me," she requested.

He sighed. "I remember my father playing with me – he made bubbles, soap bubbles with his wand so I'd try to catch them," he told her, his lips curling a bit. "And then I remember my mom telling me stories. I could be mixing it up – it could be Aunt Mia. She also read stories to me every night, sometimes three or four of them because I wouldn't fall asleep. But in those… memories I think I was sitting on her lap and clutching a strand of red hair. I think I did that a lot, clutch her hair. I liked the colour." He looked at Ginny. "It was darker than yours and it always smelled of… honey and herbal tea. That's what I remember – it's not really clear, mostly I just remember the feelings."

Ginny pursed her lips, telling herself she wouldn't cry. His words had really touched her inside but she wasn't a weepy girl. If she burst into tears, Harry would end up feeling all awkward and, Merlin, so would she. So, as much as her eyes burned, tears where to remain wherever they can from because she wasn't Cho bloody Chang! Determined to keep her eyes dry, she cleared her throat, placing one hand on his shoulder. "Well, that's… that's already more than nothing, Harry. And either those are real memories or not, you need to accept that they _are _memories for you. Don't start discarding them just because you figure they may be dreams. Even dreams like those need to have a bit of truth attached. Trust me."

He bit his lower lip but managed to give her a little smile when he turned his face to hers. "Let's open this, then?" He reached for his wand and tapped it on the box as he said _Finite Incantatem_, removing the reducing charm Sirius had placed on it two days before.

The box was bigger than he'd imagined, he noted. With a sigh, he pulled it a bit closer and opened it. It was full right up to the top and over everything else rested a small and old-looking rag doll – that sort that a parent made for a child.

"Aw, that's sweet," Ginny said, picking it up with a smile. She couldn't help noticing that whoever had made the doll had sewed bring green eyes on it, practically the same colour as Harry's, and given it dark red hair made of knitting yarn arranged in pigtails. It was a miniature Lily. "I had one of these too. Mom made it for me when I was two – it was the only doll I did like. I still have it in my bedroom. There, take it," she told her boyfriend, handing the doll to him.

Even though he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do with a doll – he was a guy, after all –, he felt something good as he held it in his hands. His mother had played with that doll as a child, so long ago. He turned to Ginny and noted she was looking at him with a smile. "What?"

"Nothing," she said, trying to cover the smile. "You just looked cute. So, what are you going to do with the doll?"

"I'm not sure," he mumbled, looking down at its dusty face with all the red hair on top. He wondered if Ginny's also resembled her owner. That made something occur to him. "You should keep it."

Ginny looked surprised. "Me? Harry, it's your mother's doll. I can't take it."

He shook his head. "Yes, you can. I'm a guy – I have no idea what to do with a doll. For mw, this one is a memory, a really good and special memory. But it will still be a memory if you're holding it for me. Besides, I suppose it will keep good company to your own rag doll too. I want you to keep it – honestly, you'll take better care of it than I ever would. Here," he said, handing it to her.

With a sigh, she took it. It meant more for her than she could say that he'd given her something that had belonged to his late mother… She smiled at him, then and reached to place a kiss on his cheek. "Thank you," she said. "I'll take good care of it for you."

"I know," he said, reaching for the box once again to see what had been under the doll. There were several books in there, from known Muggle titles to others with dates like '1973-1975' marked on them, as well as a photograph frame and what seemed to be a couple of shoeboxes. "Help me going through this, would you?" he asked Ginny. "We don't have much time before lunch, I think."

She nodded and reached for the box too, removing the shoeboxes to see what was in them.

Meanwhile, Harry removed the frame first and had to smile when he saw it showed a moving picture with very familiar faces on it – his parents along with much younger versions Sirius and Mia. They were wearing Hogwarts winter cloaks as they stood on the snowy ground and waved at the camera. It must have been taken in their seventh year, seeing as they seemed to be couples already. That one he knew what to do with: he'd put it in his bedroom when he returned home. His parents and godparents together, all of whom had taken – and some still took – a great part in making him become what he was… the good parts, at least.

"These are all photographs of your mother," Ginny told him as she held a handful of them in her hands, having taken them from one of the shoeboxes. "They look like they were removed from family albums. Some still have bits of tape glued to their backs," she said, handing him the handful to him.

There were pictures of Lily in all ages: toddler, child, teenager, even as a young adult. Some with her family, others with friends and a few alone. It seemed like Petunia Dursley had gone through a large effort to get rid of her sister's presence even in family albums, Harry thought disdainfully. He placed them back on the box carefully, vowing to go through all of them another day.

"Oh, letters," Ginny said as she opened the other shoebox and grabbed a pile of envelopes tied with a piece of yarn. "All from your mother to her sister. All unopened," she said as she went through them. "Oh, this one is fancier than the others… " she said, pulling a gold one of the letters from the pile. "I think it's a wedding invitation."

She passed the envelope to Harry and he ripped it open, noting immediately that Ginny was right.

_You are cordially invited to celebrate_

_the wedding of_

_LILY GRACE EVANS_

_and_

_JAMES CHRISTOPHER POTTER_

_On Saturday afternoon_

_the 4__th__ of August 1979_

_at four o'clock_

The text written on the delicate white paper was followed by details of where the wedding was to take place and a request for an answer. On the back of it, his mother's handwriting personally told Tuney, whom he assumed to be Petunia, she missed her and practically begged for her to come to the wedding.

"There are five more envelopes like that one in this other pile," Ginny told him in a sadened tone. "Lily must have sent the invitations loads of times."

"Yeah, but Petunia never bothered go," Harry said dryly, putting the envelope down and reaching back for the cardboard box. He'd seen the pictures of his parents' wedding loads of times and Petunia Dursley wasn't anywhere t be seen. He didn't even want to think of that woman as his aunt – there were dozens of letters in that shoebox and none was opened. She'd ignored his mother like she'd ignored him and he didn't even want to think of how much it had hurt to her being rejected by her own sister because of being a witch…

Apparently, according to Sirius had told him she was doing the same with her seven-year-old daughter. A witch too. Strangely, he could think of that girl as his cousin even though he'd never met her – maybe it was because he felt sympathetic for her…

He picked up a few of the books from the larger box, mostly the ones with the dates, and it didn't take them long to realize what they were. Diaries. All ranging from childhood to young-adulthood. Lily Potter's thoughts and feelings in written form.

"What's wrong?" Ginny asked, noting how pensive he'd become all of a sudden.

"These are her journals," he said, showing her the books.

"Really?" She reached for one of them and quickly went though a few pages. "You're right, they are. 1977…" she read on the spine of that one. "Your parents started dating in their seven year, didn't they? That must have been this year. This is great, Harry. Imagine all the stuff you can learn about them by reading this!"

He seemed tempted… almost eager to do so. But he was also conflicted. "I dunno… those are diaries, Ginny. Those things are supposed to be private… Maybe she wouldn't want me to mess with them." He wished he'd known her enough to guess what she'd think of it.

"Yes, she would," Ginny told him. "She'd want you to read them, Harry."

"How can you be sure of that?"

He sighed and swallowed hard. "Because if I had a son and died too early for him to form any memory of me, I'd be proud if he cared enough to try and get to know me, even if it was just through the words I'd written on a book," she explained. "I have a feeling your mother would have felt the same way."

There was momentary pause during which Harry's conflict seemed to ease slightly but he still didn't look quite convinced.

Ginny sighed. "Tell you what. We just have a few minutes before we have to get to lunch. How about we just put all this stuff back in the box and go back to it another day? You don't have to read anything today or decide if you even want to."

Harry nodded – yes, that was a good choice. One could only take so many discoveries a day, after all… "You're right, let's leave this for another day," he agreed, reaching for the books and putting them back inside the box as Ginny returned the letters to the shoeboxes by her side. "After all, we have all summer…" he stopped himself midsentence, recalling that wasn't really true. Sometimes he just forgot his plans for the following year. "I mean, at least until August to deal with this."

His girlfriend nodded quietly as she put the shoeboxes in the cardboard box again and the rag doll in her own book bag. "When are you going to tell Sirius and Mia about it?" she asked without looking at him.

"Soon," he said while closing the box and reducing it again so he could shove it into his bag. "When I return to London… I'm not letting them find out through someone else. It would hurt them."

Ginny nodded. "It would. I think they'll understand if you tell them, though… It was a long-time coming. Part of them must be ready for this like I was." Just as part of them would never be at the same time like she wasn't…

Suddenly, Harry felt his watch vibrating, the alert for someone approaching the boathouse, and looked at Ginny in alarm. "Someone's coming!" he told her.

She got up with a jolt and approached a window-like opening that there was on the wall – thankfully, it oversaw the main path to the castle and she quickly spotted who was approaching when she peaked through it.

"It's Fred and George," she said in annoyance. "What are they doing here?"

"Oh, thank Merlin it's them," Harry said, relaxing since they already knew the truth.

"Thank Merlin my arse!" she said, walking away from the window. "They had that plotting look on their face – I could see it miles away. I'll bet anything that if they're coming, they know we're here and are planning something. And they're damn wrong if they think I'll let them." She reached for her wand and started murmuring an unknown charm at the same time she pointed it all over the room.

"What's that spell?"

"Oh, just something Bill thought me a few years ago. Apparently, the Egyptians used this in the pyramids to scare people away from important or sacred chambers," she said.

"What? Like a curse?" Harry asked, alarmed.

"Not really. I won't hurt them – physically. They're my brothers, after all," she said, putting the wand back in her pocket and approaching her boyfriend. "It might traumatize them a bit, though. I've been meaning to use it on the twins for a while – Bill knew better than to teach it to them. Stretch your legs, will you?"

He raised an eyebrow at her but did so. "Gin, what are you doing?"

She reached down and sat straight on his lap, giving him a smile. "Creating an illusion." And with that said, she reached for his face and kissed him.

Harry almost choked in disbelief in the beginning at what she was doing but was just too weak to resist her. Still, he couldn't help wondering about what she was planning. Her brothers were coming and all she did was starting to snog him? What sort of plan was that?

When he heard the sound of steps down on the lower level, he pulled away. "Gin, what are you…?" he whispered.

"Shh," she murmured. "Just trust me. Now be a good boy and snog me, Potter."

She seemed way too confident to be wrong and he had to comply, if not for any other reason, because he was curious about what she was planning. Soon, he could hear someone climbing up one of the old ladders but this time tried not to pay it attention, which wasn't that hard with Ginny's lips moving so wonderfully against his…

But suddenly, three or four seconds later, he heard someone letting out what seemed to be a horrified scream. "_Ahh! Holy hell!_"

This time, Ginny was the one pulling away and turning to face one of her brothers, who was looking at them with wide eyes a very pale face.

She glared almost murderously. "Out of here, you little rascal. Out, out, out!" she said, forcing her voice into a squeaky yet strict tone – it didn't sound like her at all.

"Ye… yes, Madam. I'm so sorry…" the other redhead said in a tone that was completely unlike him or his twin. He was positively revolted, his face taking a green turn as he made his way down the ladder as fast as he could.

"_Hey watch it, Fred! What are you screaming about? What's going on up there?_" they heard George saying at the bottom of the ladder.

"_Nothing you'd ever want to see. Let's just get the hell out of here!"_

George's voice became enraged, then. "_Are they doing the nasty stuff up there? Oh, I'll murder Potter myself, never mind we like him at all…_"

Harry visibly paled and Ginny just covered her mouth to keep the laughter from being heard.

"_No! It's not even Harry and Ginny. Izzy tricked us_!" Fred said.

"_What? But I saw her flinching when we suggested they were at the boathouse!_" the other twin replied as his voice became more and more distant. "_It was a clear tell-sign!_"

"_Well, apparently she does have a good poker face, after all!_" That was the last thing they heard from them.

Ginny snorted, knowing they were out of earshot again, as she used her wand to de-activate the charm. "Bloody prick had it coming. Too bad George didn't have a chance to come up too…"

"Ginny, what did you do?" Harry asked in disbelief. "Why did he say it wasn't us?"

"Because it wasn't us he saw. That charm I used creates illusions. Very realistic and even scary ones. I just made it seem for anyone who entered this boathouse at that moment that two of us were not actually the two of us."

He raised an eyebrow exactly. "And who exactly were we, then?"

"Filch and Madam Pince," she said casually. "Snogging. I tried to make it seem like they had less clothes on but I can't tell if it worked…"

Harry looked horrified too. "Dear Merlin, Ginny! That's… that's sickening."

"I know!" she said, bursting into laughter. "Five galleons says Fred is going to beg George to obliviate him! It was brilliant!"

Harry tried really hard not to laugh but was unsuccessful. "That was cruel, Gin. Bloody brilliant, yes, but still cruel. Remind me not to provoke you. Ever."

"That's right, Potter, better start learning it now," she said, still laughing before she took a calming breath. "Alright, I should stop laughing. It just makes it sound mean."

Harry nodded. "Yeah, it wouldn't be fair for Fred if we just laughed like this at his expense," he agreed, trying to remain serious too.

Ginny's lower lip trembled as she recalled the whole scene again and couldn't help herself from trying to picture it from her brother's side. She looked at Harry and saw there were almost tears on his eyes from trying so hard not to crack up.

"Maybe just a little more?" she managed to say.

And with that, the two of them cracked into a massive burst of laughter again.

* * *

While Ginny and Harry experienced a great deal of amusement inside the boathouse, Sirius and Izzy made their way up to the castle, talking about little Alex and Mary's late achievements.

They were taking the usual path, which passed near the lake before turning into a fork that could either take them to the gates or lead them up to the castle. Yet, before they could take a turn to the latter Sirius stopped on his tracks as he noticed at a distance some sort of commotion taking place by the school gates between the aurors stationed there and someone outside.

"What's going on?" Izzy asked.

Her father shrugged. "No idea," he told her. "Why don't you just head up to the castle while I go check? I'll walk you to lunch another day, alright?"

"But I want to see what's happening!" she protested.

"It's probably just some angry parents standing out there pestering the Aurors," he told her.

"Yeah, right, you wouldn't be sending me away if you thought it was just that," Izzy replied in annoyance.

"Izzy, please," he pleaded.

She huffed. "Fine," she said. "But at least promise you'll tell me about it later."

He nodded. "I promise I will," he told her.

Still slightly annoyed, Izzy huffed again as she let go of his arm and made her way towards the castle. By the time she was already about a hundred yards away, Sirius turned back to the gates and made his way to them.

He could hear the angry shouting at a distance and, the closer to the gates, the more he realized it most definitely wasn't an angry-parent situation but maybe an even more annoying one instead… Midway through the path, he did understand exactly what was going on, though he spent a few seconds trying to convince himself that was simply impossible.

Because how in Merlin's name could Vernon Dursley be standing at the gates of Hogwarts yelling at the Aurors without being affected by the school's Muggle-repelling charms?

**A/N: Well, I've got my computer back from repair... only it wasn't repaired because the sound card is doomed for good. Lucky me *sarcastic tone* Aside from my luck, this huge-chapter (8700 words!) syndrome seems to be chronic... Good for you, bad for my hours of sleep... I hope you liked the chapter. I was really going to cut it in a half but since I'd promised to open the box... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	33. Blood Ties

**A/N: Not as big as the others... because I scrapped a 3000 word scene that was 'bugging me'. Talk about a waste of time...**

How Vernon had gotten there was a question that Sirius couldn't honestly say he had an answer for… Yet the man – or rather the stupid oaf – was there and he didn't seem happy at all to be locked out has he banged his beefy hands on the sturdy metal gates. He pitied the aurors who stood awkwardly on the opposite side of the gates, trying to figure out what was going on while the crazy man waved his arms around and yelled nonsense like a mad person.

Annoyed, he cautiously approached the gates although he didn't really feel like handling that really unpleasant situation. He could just turn around and let the aurors handle it. But then again it was just cruel to leave them in the dark…

"… _do you have any idea how long it takes to get here from Surrey? Ten hours! Ten bloody hours! __And longer if you count the time we spent looking for the wretched castle! We even had to sleep in some dirty godforsaken inn to get here just to end up with some idiots telling us we can't go in. What's all this commotion, anyway? To protect a bloody pile of ruins? School my arse! This is a sham!_" Vernon was shouting.

Petunia stood behind him, quiet and with her arms crossed, clearly displeased either from the whole pitiful display or from being there at all.

A few yards behind her, leaning against Vernon's shiny car (completely out of place in there) with a bored expression on his face, was a burly blonde teenager who wore a maroon school uniform – Sirius assumed him to be the son, Dudley Dursley. It was with satisfaction that he spotted inside the car a shape with strawberry blonde hair and curious eyes nearly squished against the window. Little Quinn. He couldn't tell if it was for the distance of for the fact that she was too busy staring at the castle's form but the little girl didn't seem to have noticed him there.

"_Sir, I need to ask you to calm down while we handle this situation_," one of the aurors – the one Sirius vaguely recalled to be named Williamson – was telling the purple-faced man just as Sirius stepped closer.

"I will _not_…" His angry face turned to Sirius as soon as he spotted him. "Oi, you! You're the one who got us in this! Tell them to let us in, tell them…"

"Do yourself a favour shut up, Dursley!" Sirius called back before approaching the youngest auror – likely Williamson's trainee – in order to figure out on what going on. "How long has this one been here, Mr…?"

"B… Bellings, sir. He got here about ten minutes ago and just started yelling," the young auror said.

"Bloke's clearly a Muggle with that automobile thingy he was riding…" Williamson said as he made his way to them, deciding to ignore Vernon Dursley's shouts and insults since he simply had no patience for it. "How can he even be here? The muggle-repelling charms…"

"Any chance they're down right now?" Sirius asked.

The older auror shook his head. "Can't be. They're still affecting the bloke at least a little if he sees the castle as a pile of ruins… Doesn't make any sense!"

"Have you called McGonagall already?" he asked.

Williamson nodded and pointed at his trainee. "Bellings here sent her a Patronus. Should be here in a few moments. You know 'grumpy' over there, Black?"

He nodded. "Only vaguely but enough to feel sorry I do," Sirius told him. "Distant Muggle relative, so to speak – I only just met him a few days ago. Rubbed me as a complete arse less than one minute in."

"Sounds pretty accurate to me," the young auror murmured, his trainer nodding in approval.

"Right," Sirius mumbled before huffing. "Do you mind if I go have a word with him?"

"Be my guest," Williamson replied, glad he wasn't doing it himself.

It was like the man had aura of nastiness, Sirius thought as he approached Vernon. His mood was decaying by each step he took and he felt tempted to just walk away several times. But then again, if there was any reason aside from Harry for him to accept talking to Vernon Dursley, that one was sitting in his car and her name was Quinn. Poor kid didn't deserve such a nasty father or, well, step-father and even much less deserved to be endangered by his pig-headedness.

He cleverly turned his ears off at Vernon's insults as he wasn't really sure if his fist would be able to break through the school wards straight into the idiot's face without breaking a few bones or something… He'd be damned if he's risk having himself injured over that idiot.

"What the hell are you doing here, Dursley?" Sirius asked him harshly before looking over the man's shoulder at Petunia's unmoving form. "Didn't I tell you to go to Figg if you wanted our damn protection?" he asked the woman.

"Oi," Vernon yelled. "I don't take orders from you, some former escaped convict! I may go along with your protection proposal but I'm doing it in my own terms! You're lucky I even believe in that whole story of us being in danger because of some troublemaker we don't even know!"

This time, Sirius couldn't keep himself from trying to reach across the gates' bars in order to grab the other man by the lapels and give him a damn good shake. He was unable to do so, though, as he felt his hands touching a solid invisible barrier that separated him from Dursley. He cursed eloquently in frustration under his breath. "You really are a stupid idiot, aren't you?" he said, feeling the fury pump through his veins. "You have just no idea what Voldemort's minions would do with a bloke like you and your family if they got their hands on you… which will be very easy for them if you keep trying to be in charge! And I hope that by 'troublemaker' you don't mean Harry because you don't know a thing about your nephew."

"I know enough to say we wouldn't be in this mess if it wasn't for him! I had to take an extended leave from work for this! Barely had time to explain it to the neighbours."

"Oh, well, what's having a life as opposed to having a job and a reputation?" Sirius told him sarcastically. "Driving all the way from Surrey to here… could you expose yourself a little more? Maybe draw a bull's eye on your car, since you're at it. Do you have a death wish? How did you even know where Hogwarts was, anyway?"

Vernon said nothing and just looked at Petunia.

Her lips remained pursed to their usual thin line until she uttered a short explanation. "Lily wrote to me and told me about it when we were young."

Back then, she still read her letters – letters she hadn't been able to give away to the boy, her nephew as all others she'd actually opened – hoping, selfishly, that her little sister would hate it at Hogwarts, that she would beg to come back home and leave that world of abnormality behind. But she didn't. Instead, Lily wrote about her new friends – freaks too – and how wonderful her new school was, an amazing castle located in the Scottish highlands just a few miles north of a small village called Invergarry.

And now, there she was. But the castle? A bunch of ruins. That was all she saw. She could tell by Quinn's amazed look just as they'd parked that what she saw was different than what she… her people did. Maybe it had been the jealousy for her daughter's ability that had made her order the little girl to stay in the car… What world was that that gave them everything – Lily and Quinn, and her nothing? The powers, the simple ability to see through whatever was covering the castle's real form. She loved them and hated them at the same time – that was the cross she had to bear for the rest of her life…

"Fine, so you people – dumbly – just packed your stuff and came to us," Sirius concluded. "But why Hogwarts? Why come here of all places? What made you think we'd be here? Mia and I."

"We didn't care if you were here or not," Vernon told them detachedly. "What we cared was that the boy was. And you wouldn't have offered us protection if he didn't have it too – the best of it. Well, I'll only take the best for myself, so…"

"Merlin, you really are a self-serving arse, aren't you, Vernon?" Sirius said in disgust. "Well, sorry to disappoint but this school has magical protection all over." He touched the invisible barrier that passed through the gaps between the bars to illustrate it. "Plus, Mia and I are always around – Harry doesn't need a personal bodyguard from the Order here. You should have just stayed at home and waited for us to get there."

"I don't care! I am still the man of this family – I will not take orders from your people!"

At a distance, Sirius could tell Dudley had heard it and was shaking his head dryly, as if saying 'not again'. His father's pig-headedness was no news to him.

Inside the car, he could see Quinn watching him now, softly waving through the window. Sirius waved back and stepped back from the gates when Vernon turned around to start fighting with his wife by telling her he wasn't going along with that sham and was going back home. The one moment when Sirius felt like Petunia might just slightly have a backbone was when she informed him that he was free to go but she was staying and so were the children – Vernon's face had become so purple Sirius nearly believed the guy was choking but instead he started yelling even more loudly.

Several minutes passed with the couple having a shouting match, which Dudley managed to ignore by talking to his little sister through a slight crack on the car window – he did it so naturally that it led Sirius to the conclusion that his parents' fights were sort of a routine to him…

McGonagall arrived in a matter of moments from there, clad in black like she'd been since her closest friend, Dumbledore, had passed away and with a worried expression on her face. She made her way to the aurors and so did Sirius, certain none of them would be able to explain the situation like him.

"Who _are _those people?" she asked, displeased. "Muggles, you said, Mr. Williamson?"

The older auror nodded. "Yes, Madam. Muggles for sure."

"Not just any Muggles," Sirius added. "The Dursleys."

McGonagall looked at him, completely stunned. "The… the Dursleys? Here at Hogwarts?"

Sirius nodded. "That's right," he confirmed.

"But why, for the love of Merlin?" the woman asked, not understanding one bit of the story.

He turned to the aurors and gave them an apologetic look – they weren't part of the Order, after all, so it wasn't advisable that they'd hear the conversation. "Can you give us a moment, please?"

Both gave him a doubtful look but did step away to mind their business when McGonagall gave them one of her fierce looks. Sirius told the headmistress about what he had gathered from Vernon and Petunia, then: how they'd gotten there, why… By the time he was done, McGonagall was already shaking her head in a disapproving fashion the way she did when a student ended up in her office in trouble.

"How reckless of them – honestly, coming all the way to Scotland to make a point without protection to escort them," the woman said, shaking her head and reaching for her wand. "Will you give me a minute, Sirius? I need to send a Patronus to Alastor – explain all this and arrange for them to be transported to a safe house immediately."

Sirius nodded and McGonagall got to work. Mad-Eye wouldn't be happy and if there was ever any time he'd been craving for one of the former auror's lectures, provided it was directed straight to the snotty couple, that was just it. He didn't even have to hear it – he just wanted to see their faces when being yelled yet by the mangled man.

After the silvery form of the headmistress's owl patronus flew away, the headmistress approached the Aurors and told them to let the Dursleys in, though she didn't look happy about it. "All of them," she instructed before making her way to Sirius again – she was still gathering the patience to deal with that lot and wasn't quite ready to meet them straight at the gates. "The arrangements are being done – they're lucky we value their nephew so much or we wouldn't put up with their temper."

"Tell me about it – I wouldn't shed a tear if Vernon really decided to stay behind. Petunia seems to be set to leave with the children and that's what matters the most," he said. "I still don't get how they managed to get here – I thought the Muggle-repelling charms always gave any Muggles that were approaching the idea that they didn't want to come here. That they were needed somewhere else."

McGonagall nodded. "Yes, that's truth. But not in all cases."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Well, there's an exception to the muggle-repelling charms – Dumbledore created it himself. Made sure that even when new Muggle-repelling charms were cast on the school, there would always be… well, a backdoor to them."

"But why?" Sirius asked, not really getting the point.

McGonagall sighed. "Imagine you were a Muggle and you lived in a village near the school. You didn't have much money and you needed to bring your child to Hogwarts – the thing is, the Hogwarts express has a single stop before Hogwarts, which is King's Cross. Well, taking your child all the way to London only for him or her to come back to Scotland in the Hogwarts express would be rather pointless and expensive, not to mention a waste of time, don't you think?"

Sirius nodded. "It makes sense, now that you mention it," he had to admit.

"It does, doesn't it?" she said. "Wizards can bring their children to Hogwarts personally if they please – apparate just outside the gates and drop them off with the teacher in charge of watching them. Well, Dumbledore found it rather unfair that Muggles couldn't do the same because of the Muggle repelling charms and created this back door for them – only for them. They can't quite see what the castle looks like but they won't be compelled to leave by the spells. This course is rarely used but the point is that it is available when needed."

"So this 'backdoor' always opens for Muggle parents?" Sirius asked.

McGonagall shook her head. "Not always and not specifically just for parents – after all, not all children are raised by their parents. The criteria for it are that Muggles can approach the castle if they are escorting an underage Wizard or Witch and in the condition that they are previously aware of the Wizarding World's existence. Now, you mentioned they had a young daughter, didn't you, Sirius? A witch?"

He nodded. "Quinn. She's in their car," he said. "I don't think they are here to escort her, though."

"She's with them – that seems to be enough for the backdoor to open. Perhaps later I will try to find a way to have the spells to read the Muggles' intentions before allowing them near." She sighed and shook her head. "That might avoid odd situations like this one…"

Sirius nodded. "Pro… er… Minerva, I need to ask you a favour. Vernon has no idea the little girl is a witch – I'd rather it remained that way. He hates all magic things and is already enough of an arse to the girl as it is. I have reason to believe that she's not his – by birth, I mean. And I wouldn't be surprised if he knew it too."

The headmistress nodded sympathetically. "He won't learn what she is from me – it's a shame he'd act like that with any child, his or not. Is there any chance she has a wizard father?"

He shrugged. "Maybe. But Petunia doesn't rub me as a person that would have an affair with a wizard after all the grief she gave to Lily for being magical. She might not know he could be one, though. Honestly, that's for her to know."

McGonagall nodded and glanced at the gates only to see Vernon and Petunia already inside, the first one now yelling face-to-face at the mortified youngest auror. She wondered if it was acceptable for her to cast a tongue-tying hex on the man – he didn't seem to shut up long enough to let other people speak. Plain rude, that one was. "Well, I should go over there and have a word with them." She took a deep breath. "Hopefully Alastor will be here soon."

Sirius nodded. "I'd offer to go along but I'm afraid that without the wards I won't be able to resist punching his face until it looks like a cake."

The headmistress gave him a stern look. "Then you'd better stay where you are. I will have no brawling in my school, Mr. Black."

"Yes, ma'am," he agreed almost automatically, watching as his old teacher walked away, towards the couple.

He could tell that, even for McGonagall, it was hard to keep an even tone around those two when she reached them, cordially pulling them aside to a more secluded spot as to avoid a show for any students who might be watching.

"Hi!" he heard a familiar voice greeting him. He looked to his left and saw little Quinn running towards him with a big smile, followed closely by her brother, who looked quite uncertain.

"Hello Quinn," he greeted the little girl back with a smile, glancing at her parents to make sure they weren't watching – he wouldn't want to get her in trouble. "I wasn't expecting to see you here."

"Mommy packed our things and said we had to leave. We stopped at Duddley's school to get him too," she said, pointing at her older brother.

"So you're Dudley," Sirius told the boy. He really was big but not quite on the fat side like his father. "Nice to meet you. I'm Sirius Black."

He offered his hand to shake and Dudley took it a bit reluctantly – he still wasn't sure of what to think of Sirius at first.

"You're the bloke who went to talk to Mom," the boy said, a bit awkwardly. "Quinn told me about you. You really are like her? You can do those things?"

Sirius nodded. "Many people can, actually, you just don't know about it."

"So, is it true we're in danger?" he asked in a whisper, so Quinn wouldn't catch it – she was once again distracted, looking at the castle up on the hill. "Mom said we'd be in danger if we stayed at home and Quinn told me she overheard Mom and Dad saying it had to do with your world – they're avoiding telling me about it, though. Not sure how they'll be able to keep it up now… But anyway, is it true?"

Sirius had to nod. "Yes, you're in danger. And it has to do with our world – there's a war going on."

"A war?"

He nodded again. "Long story short, there's this evil guy who thinks he's entitled to have the world the way he likes it. He's not too fond of your people – we call them _Muggles_ – or people like us who are born from people like you." He wasn't lying but he certainly tried to bend the story so he wouldn't need to mention Harry's part in it.

Dudley immediately looked at his little sister. "She's in danger too? She's just a kid – she did nothing wrong."

"Everyone is in danger either they did something wrong or not. You Muggles are just the most vulnerable ones," Sirius stated, just as Quinn turned her attention back to them.

"Where are we?" she asked, her eyes shining with curiosity.

Sirius grinned at her. "Remember that special school I told you about?"

Her eyes became huge as she looked at him. "It's here? In the pretty castle?"

He nodded. "That's right."

"Are there princesses up there?" she asked in amazement. "Like in the storybooks?"

Sirius chuckled. "There will be once you enroll."

She giggled and turned to the castle again. "Can I go see it now? Inside?"

"Well, that wouldn't be fair, would it?" he asked – he wouldn't mind showing it to her but it was just too urgent getting her and her family into hiding. A tour would have to wait for another day, another year, even. "All the other kids have to wait until they turn eleven. It's sort of a rule."

Her face fell just a little but she smiled again once she started imagining her life in the big castle a few years from then.

"It really is a castle?" Dudley whispered, doubtfully. "Not a bunch of ruins? 'Cause that's what I see… I thought Quinn was imagining it when she said there was a real castle – little kids have a big imagination."

"Not this big," Sirius informed him. "She can see it because she's like us. There are charms all over that keep you people from stumbling on us – they make the castle look like a bunch of uninteresting ruins and sometimes even make you think they want to leave."

The boy scratched his chin, seemingly interested. "Quinn said you told her she should come to this school when she turns eleven – that Mom and Dad might try and stop her. I just wanted you to know that, if that's the best for her, I'll make sure she comes here. By then I'll be of age." He glanced at Quinn, now admiring a bunch of wild flowers growing by the roots of a tree.

Sirius couldn't help feeling impressed. "You really care for her, don't you?"

"She's my sister," he said, sighing. "I didn't like her at first. I was the only kid before her, so I got all the attention and all the presents. Then she came." Dudley wasn't sure why he was telling some bloke he'd met like five minutes before all that stuff. He just felt like he needed to let that out – the story had been hidden inside him for so long. "Dad didn't mind her for some reason but Mom was always busy taking care of her 'cause she was a baby. I didn't like it. And then one day, she must be four or five at the time, Mom just started treating her differently, more… harshly."

"She must have seen Quinn using magic," Sirius concluded.

Dudley nodded. "Probably. I still wasn't a big fan of her but it felt wrong – Dad ignoring her, Mom throwing a fit at anything she did… It was nothing like they'd treated me. I guess I started to like Quinn out of pity. Then, Mom and Dad started to make all those big plans for my future, selling drills and stuff like that like what I wanted didn't matter, no matter what I said. And Quinn was just there – listening. She's not even seven, it's weird, but sometimes it's like she understands exactly what I'm saying, no matter how grown-up it sounds."

"Sometimes kids grow up faster than they should," Sirius told him from his own experience.

"I suppose. She's always been here for me even after I was an arse and always made fun of her," Dudley summed up. "The least I can do is pay the favour back. She's my little sister."

Sirius sighed – hopefully Dudley would have more success being an older brother than he had… He probably would. Regulus had been too close to sources of corruption: their parents, their cousins… That wasn't Quinn's case. "You're a good bloke, Dudley," Sirius told him.

Dudley remained quiet in response and just turned to see what Quinn was up too.

It was around that time that Sirius noticed another presence watching them from a few a few yards away on the path. Harry. He appeared to be moving his lips, though there didn't seem to be anyone around to speak to him – he'd bet anything Ginny was right there with him under his invisibility cloak…

"Would you mind staying here for a moment?" Sirius told Dudley, who shrugged in return.

He quickly made his way back to the path and walk along it until he reached his godson, who'd stopped talking in the meanwhile.

"Hi, there, kid," he greeted, "and Ginny."

There was a hiss and then the redhead's voice came. "_How did you know I was here?_"

"Well, it was either someone being here under the invisibility cloak or Harry having a chat with the voices in his head, which wouldn't be a good sign at all…" Sirius explained, standing by Harry's side and pretending he was just talking to him. "Plus, Izzy mentioned it was your turn to use the invisibility cloak for your secret meetings."

"_Yeah… Listen, what did Izzy tell Fred and George for them to find out we were at the boathouse?_"Ginny asked.

"Oh, well, nothing on purpose," Sirius assured her. "Believe me, I was there when it happened – they used this whole guessing thing and just started throwing names of places at her and she happened to flinch when they said 'boathouse'. Poor Izzy didn't stand a chance against those two," he declared. "I take it you're asking me that because you received a couple of unexpected visits over there…"

"_Oh, we received them alright_," Ginny said in a conniving tone.

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "What's that tone you're using?"

Harry cleared his throat at that. "Long story. Let's just say Ginny taught them a valuable lesson."

"_By now, Fred must be trying to find a way to get the last twenty minutes of his life wiped out from his memory,_" Ginny stated proudly from under the cloak.

Sirius furrowed his brow. "What did you do?"

"_Oh, we'll tell you later_," she promised.

"Anyway," Harry said, "we were just going back to the castle but then we saw McGonagall rushing down here."

"_We figured something important must be happening_," Ginny stated.

Harry turned to Dudley and Quinn, then. "What happened? Who are those two?"

"Well, we also got a… an unexpected visit," Sirius informed him.

"_From who?_"

Sirius hesitated before speaking. "The Dursleys."

There was a silent pause, which Harry used to register the information. "You mean my… relatives?" He felt Ginny's hand rubbing against his arm in a supportive fashion.

His godfather nodded, pointing his thumb in the direction where the headmistress had gone along with his uncle and aunt. "McGonagall is talking to Vernon and Petunia right now."

"_But why are they here? How? Aren't they Muggles? Mostly, I mean," _Ginny inquired in a surprised tone.

"How they got here is too long of a story for me to tell you right now," Sirius said. "Ask me again another time, okay? About the 'why', well, long story short, Vernon Dursley is a stubborn arse who thinks he's 'the man'. He figured he could get his hands on your bodyguards," he told Harry.

"I don't have bodyguards," his godson said flatly.

"That's what I told him. His loss," his godfather pointed out.

"_So those two are…_" Ginny said, meaning the youngest Dusleys.

"Dudley and Quinn Dursley," Sirius stated. "Harry's cousins." He turned to Harry and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Listen, kid, just because they're here, it doesn't mean you have to talk to any of them right now. I haven't told them about you, so, if you want, you can just walk…"

Harry shook his head, feeling Ginny's touch leaving his right arm as she reached for his hand. "No, it's okay. I… it's not their fault their parents are the way they are. I've actually been wondering about them ever since you told me about the little girl…"

Sirius nodded. "Well, want me to introduce them to you?"

The dark-haired boy hesitated but ended up nodding.

"_Remember I'm here if you need_," Ginny murmured against his ear. "_Just because I'm invisible doesn't mean you get an excuse to forget me_."

"As if I ever could…" he responded, smiling just a little.

His godfather gestured with his head towards Dudley and the three of them started walking in that direction.

Moody had already arrived, Sirius noted, watching the man stepping into the school grounds accompanied by Hestia Jones and Dedalus Diggle as the young auror whose name Sirius had already forgotten held the metal gates open for them.

McGonagall and the older Dursleys emerged from where they'd been talking and Sirius could swear Petunia had nearly fainted at the sight of the Mad-Eye. Then, he saw Moody reaching for his wand as the gates closed back and cast some sort of spell around them. And when the retired auror opened his mouth to yell, no sound reached Sirius – he could only imagine how loud the bloke was shouting for him to have cast a silencing charm around himself and the Dursleys.

Oblivious to that, Quinn was now standing on a rock by her brother's side, as if trying to stand more closely to him in terms of height, and seemed to be pointing at the castle.

"… _and there's a big tower, really tall like the buildings in London_," she was saying, referring the astronomy tower.

"That tall?" Dudley asked

"_Really, really _tall. Rapunzel tall," she assured him before jumping off the rock and looking at Sirius again. "Have you ever been up there?"

"Loads of times," he told her – not once since Dumbledore had been killed, though… "What's a Rapunzel?"

Quinn frowned. "Not what, who! She's a princess with really long hair – she lives in a really tall tower without a door and lets her hair down for the evil witch who raised her to climb – and the prince too when the bad witch is away."

"Hum, sounds interesting," Sirius told her as Dudley eyes Harry cautiously. "Though, I know for a fact that most witches are not evil."

"You know _real_ witches?" she asked, amazed – she still hadn't figured out that the actual name for what she was happened to be 'witch'. "Ugly ones with crooked noses?"

"Mostly pretty ones with regular noses," he assured her with a chuckle. "Listen, I've got here someone you might like to meet," he declared, gesturing to his godson. "This is Harry, your cousin."

Both Quinn and Dudley seemed completely surprised for several moments, faced with that revelation.

"I didn't know we had a cousin," Dudley mumbled in a restrained fashion. "Er… our aunt Lily's son?"

Harry just nodded since his tongue didn't seem to be working at the moment – he felt Ginny's hand gripping his own and could almost hear her telling him to calm down despite her not saying a word.

Quinn was blunter than her brother, though. "Really? So you're like me? Mr. Sirius said your Mommy was like me too. Does that mean you study here too? Is it great living in a castle?"

He was almost taken aback by the many questions but there was something in the little girl's greenish brown eyes that made him relax. It's wasn't the eyes, it was the face. She looked vaguely like his mother – just enough so the familiarity would feel… calming. "Er… yeah. I'm like you, I study here and it's great." He could almost see Ginny smiling proudly at his articulate response.

"How come we've never met you before?" she asked.

He shrugged. "I dunno. I didn't really know about you until a few days ago."

"Mom never told us of you," Dudley stated in a purely informative tone. "Then again, she barely ever mentioned your mom." He swallowed hard and offered him his hand. "Er… nice to meet you, then, I'm Dudley. This is Quinn."

"Quinn spelled with an 'i' and two 'n's, not two 'e's and an 'n'," the little girl added like it was vital he knew that.

For a moment, she reminded him of Hermione too and he had to chuckle… "So noted," he assured her. He felt Ginny's invisible hand shake against his arm and figured she's found the little girl amusing too.

"_Diddy!"_ they heard a female voice, Petunia's, calling.

Dudley's blush at the nickname was worthy of a true Weasley. "She's got to stop calling me that," he mumbled under his breath, as he turned to his mother.

Petunia stood near the gates, very pale and glaring at Sirius in a 'get away from those kids, they're mine' way. Then, her eyes met Harry's at a distance and she simply froze in her place for several moments before her nephew looked away. No doubt she knew exactly who he was…

"Well," Dudley told Harry as his little sister hugged Sirius goodbye. "We need to go. Maybe after this… er, thing is over – the hiding – we can meet sometime?"

"Yeah, after it's over," Harry agreed – strangely, he did look forward to it. Blood really was thicker than water that way. "I'll be busy for a while… with this war thing."

His cousin seemed surprised. "You're in it too? You're what? Sixteen like me?"

Harry nodded. "I'm in this much more deeply than you can imagine," he mumbled.

"Well, good luck then," Dudley told him before retreating back, getting ready to leave.

Before they did, though, little Quinn climbed back onto the rock she'd been on earlier, which placed her right opposite Harry. She gestured for him to come down and he did, figuring she wanted to tell him some sort of secret. Instead, she kissed his cheek, which nearly made him jump in surprise. He heard a strangled laughing sound coming from his right, which gave away Ginny's amusement at his reaction.

"Will you come and visit me, Harry?" his little cousin asked.

Even though he immediately related visiting Quinn to the possibility of accidentally running into his estranged aunt and uncle, he couldn't help nodding – there was just something entirely too sweet about that little girl with the reddish blonde hair that made it hard for him to say 'no' to her. "Er… sure. If I can. Might take a while, though."

She gave him a radiant smile anyway and ran to join her older brother again.

Sirius chuckled and clapped his godson's back as Dudley and Quinn walked away. "If when you have kids you end up with one as cute as that, you're doomed for life, kid," he warned him. "She's pretty amazing, isn't she? That's saying something, considering who's been raising her…"

Harry nodded. "Reminded me of Hermione with all the questions," he admitted.

"_You know, if she wasn't your cousin and a decade younger than you, I might have gotten jealous that such a cute girl would kiss you," _Ginny informed him from under the cloak – he could practically hear her smiling as she spoke.

"Oh, don't worry – even if they weren't related and she was your age, she's not red-headed enough for him. Potters have a very specific type," Sirius informed her with a laugh before looking at Harry. "Not so bad meeting them, was it?"

Harry shook his head. "No, not so bad. Dudley was okay too, I suppose. It was better than i expected." He kept his eyes on his cousins as they made their way to their parents, now flanked by Hestia Jones and Dedalus Diggle, their protectors from then on.

He felt a weight on his right shoulder and figured it was Ginny resting her invisible head there – in a way, it felt awkward feeling her there but not seeing. In another way, it just felt right… in fact, rightness trumped over awkwardness as it should. He'd have wrapped one arm around Ginny's form in return too but he figured that would look just odd for anyone who saw him half-hugging an invisible form – he definitely didn't need to give people more reasons to think he was out of his nut.

Petunia glanced up at him one last time, this time without freezing, and nodded. Maybe it was an apology, maybe just an acknowledgement of his presence – he ended up nodding in return, though his gesture didn't have any actual meaning for him. Maybe it had for her… he didn't really care. His aunt turned to the gates again and approached them with her husband, children and new protectors.

One of the aurors opened the gates to allow them to get out and Quinn turned back one last time to wave at them, to which neither he nor Sirius couldn't help responding with waving too. Ginny for a moment wished she wasn't wearing the cloak so she could wave too…

And as the Dursleys stepped out of Hogwarts, Harry silently wished them all good luck. And hoped he's at least see some of them again in the future.

**A/N2: Well, I hope you liked the chapter - seemed like it was needed as a follow-up for the other one about the Dursleys... I'd write more but I'm exhausted (It's 4 in the morning...). Feedback is welcome, as always! Review!**


	34. Falling Apart

**A/N: Another chapter posted at 4 in the morning. Why am I still awake at this hour, you might ask? Film marathon. Why was I making a film marathon? Because I've spent _all weekend with no sign of internet_ (the guys from the internet provider blamed it on the god-awful weather that's been up lately) and got completely bored (makes you put your life into perspective when losing all internet access nearly gives you a panic attack - just how dependant are we on technology?)**

**That said, the chapter has been ready for posting since Saturday afternoon but circumstances wouldn't let me post it. Well, here it goes. **

-

**17 June 1997**

Once again, as it was tradition at the end of each school-year, Hogsmeade station filled with Hogwarts students and their respective possessions, all ready to make their way back home. The big difference that year was that – noticeably – over a third of the students (the ones that hadn't dropped from the school already) wouldn't be doing so through the Hogwarts Express as it was usual – the crowd of concerned parents was, once again, present, some missing work just for the purpose of taking their children home themselves by means of apparition, portkeys and floo.

"Dumb o' 'em if yeh ask me," Hagrid commented as he stood with Sirius at the platform. "Bloody train's as safe as Hogwarts. It's covered with almost the same wards as the school's ever since the track itself was built, it is! Couldn' be safer, tha' train."

It was true all precautions had been taken with the train just as they'd been taken with Hogwarts itself. And as annoyed as he often felt with how whiny those overprotective parents could be, he couldn't really blame them for not wanting to risk anything with their kids… Maybe if he wasn't so closely involved with Hogwarts, he'd be on their side of the equation. "If it makes them feel better, let them do what they want. It's their life," Sirius replied, shrugging, before looking up at the half-giant. "Got any special assignment from the Order this summer, Hagrid? Providing you're allowed to share, that is."

The other man shook his head. "Just guardin' the school as usual," he stated. "I'm teachin' Grawpy how to do the job too – bloke his size comes handy for somethin' like it."

Even as he had to bite his lower lip not to laugh at the mental picture of Hagrid's massive half-brother, Sirius didn't doubt it at all – he was pretty sure a fifteen feet tall giant guarding the gates could smash any invader with one of his feet into the consistence of pie filling without a blink of an eye…

Before he could make any sort of reply to Hagrid, he heard a tapping sound coming from somewhere near him and looked up only to see Mia inside the train through one of its windows, pointing at her watch as she stood on the aisle in order to remind him it was time for him to board the train.

As if he'd forgotten the two of them were on Hogwarts Express duty that day, he thought… He was actually looking forward to it – joke was on Mad-Eye if he'd just forced that assignment on them as payback for Mia constantly telling him off for trying to run Harry's life with his overbearing protection routines.

Despite them both knowing the former auror meant well in his own messed up way, the overbearing part was often pushed too far, especially when he'd suggested they placed a full-time surveillance charm on their godson – a charm that only worked if its target had been previously fed a weakening potion to lower their own magic's natural resistance and was only used by aurors to keep an eye on convicts that had been conditionally freed from Azkaban. Safe to say Mia hadn't been happy about someone suggesting that her godson was treated the same way as some creep would be, even if it was for 'his own protection'.

Still, as Mad-Eye's courtesy payback or not, with the present circumstances of the war it was understandable that, even though the train was heavily warded, the idea of letting a few dozens of teenagers ride on the train only guarded by two adults – one a wizard (the train conductor) and another a squib (the food-trolley lady) – hadn't seemed so appealing for the Order, especially when one of said teenagers was the 'Chosen-One'.

Sirius was awakened from his thoughts by the sound of train whistle calling everyone inside and saw Mia wasn't standing at the window anymore. He turned to Hagrid for a moment, who didn't seem to have noticed his thoughtful state, having been busy urging the students into the train. "Well, Hagrid, I supposed I'd better go. The wife's waiting – wouldn't want to piss her off."

Hagrid chuckled. "'lright, then. Have a nice journey, yeh two."

"Will do," he replied, before making his way to one of the train's entrances and climbing into it.

Inside, the aisle wasn't as cluttered with people searching for compartments as he recalled it to be back when he was the student, which was certainly justified by the fact that less students were travelling in that train.

At the opposite side of the carriage, he spotted a flash of red hair entering a compartment, followed by Izzy, who waved at him from a distance before stepping into the same compartment with Luna Lovegood and Neville Longbottom in a tow. Harry didn't seem to be with them, which would be natural since he wasn't supposed to be seen anywhere near Ginny (whom he identified as the flash of red he'd seen) these days – he'd probably be sitting with Ron and Hermione that time.

The train started moving in a matter of seconds and finding Mia wasn't very hard after that as he quickly spotted her sitting alone by the window inside the last compartment before the train's steam locomotive.

He opened the sliding door just enough to poke his head inside and grin at her as she raised her eyes from the periodical she was reading at the moment. "Mind if I sit here, Madam?"

His wife's eyes were defiant. "I don't know… my husband might not like the idea of me sitting alone with some random bloke. He's pretty possessive."

Sirius's grin widened as he opened the door further and stepped in, closing it behind him. "So dump him and let's run away together," he suggested.

She gave him a considering look. "Tempting," she observed. "He _can_ be sort of an idiot sometimes. Makes me wonder why I even fell for him."

"Oi," Sirius complained at the same time he took a few steps further and sat opposite his wife. "I resent that. Your husband happens to be a great catch. Nice bloke, easy in the eyes, great kisser… even better at other stuff," he stated.

She raised her eyebrows. "Hum, and how would you know that, Mr. Stranger-who-just-walked-into-my-compartment-and-asked-me-to-run-away-with-him?" she asked teasingly.

He grinned. "Word on the street, of course," he said.

"Is that so?" she asked sceptically, her eyes returning to her issue of '_History Heritage_' as her lips curved slightly. "You know, for a moment there I wondered if you were planning to skiv on this Hogwarts Express duty and dump it all on me."

"Do a bunk on you just to miss the pleasure of your company?" he asked sweetly. "I would _never_. Plus, I wouldn't want to miss this opportunity to ride on the Hogwarts express again." Sirius shifted, taking a lounging position along the seats on his side of the compartment. "You know, I don't think I'd realized how much I missed being in this stupid old train until now. Well-worth the eight-hour journey."

Mia sighed, closing the magazine and putting it down on the empty seat by her side for a moment, looking out the window to see the same landscapes she recalled seeing so many times when she was a student herself. "Feels rather nostalgic, doesn't it?"

He nodded. "Yeah. It's ridiculous: I haven't ridden in this train in… what? Twenty years? Yet, it looks _exactly _the same. Some things just never change, do they?" There, he could almost close his eyes and forget the mess the world was in at the moment: the war, the losses, the imminent dark.

His wife smiled faintly. "They really don't. And that would be nineteen years. Since you've last ridden in this train, I mean. Well, unless you were here in the meanwhile and I haven't heard about it."

He shook his head. "No, not since the end of our seventh year. Nineteen years… Merlin, that's how long we've been out of school?" he asked in amazement and disbelief. "Seems like it was yesterday."

She smiled. "It does, doesn't it? Time passes in a heartbeat."

He nodded solemnly. Nineteen years, twelve of which he'd spent locked away… It felt time had passed quickly now but he remember perfectly enough that at Azkaban each second had seemed like a minute and each minute like an hour. Now, thank Merlin, those years seemed to be part of another life even though he knew they weren't… _Forget it, _he told himself. Going there wouldn't do him any good. "You've taken the Hogwarts Express after that, haven't you? After we graduated."

She nodded. "The first year I worked here at the school. And the one after that too. Remus came too that year as well – it was when…"

"… I was on the run, wasn't it?" he asked in a sombre tone, doing the math himself. "A Dementor entered the train searching for me, ended up hovering all over Harry. Remus mentioned it once in one of our monthly get-togethers. Before his furry little problem kicked in, that is."

By 'monthly get-togethers' Sirius actually meant the nights he would spend helping their friend through his werewolf transformations – Tonks had been the first one to use that expression to refer those nights, actually, and it had sort of become a private joke. She'd always take a night shift at the auror department to entertain herself and her husband would be off for his monthly get-together with his best-mate. It worked out pretty well in an odd sort of way.

"That's right," Mia told him, concerning the Dementor's appearance that time almost four years before. "Dumbledore was furious about it, of course, because many students were affected aside from Harry." She sighed. "He was one of the worst, for obvious reasons – he even fainted because it got so close to him. But Izzy didn't do very well, either – she was in the compartment next-door to his. She looked even paler than Ginny and, well, Ginny had pretty awful things to remember from what had happened at the Chamber of Secrets."

Sirius frowned and sat straight on his seat in alarm. "Izzy had something that awful to remember too?"

Mia shook her head. "It wasn't quite what she remembered, Sirius. It was what she figured out," she explained.

Her husband gave her a clueless look. "What she figured out?"

"You don't need to have horrible memories for the Dementors to make you feel like you'll never be happy again," she stated quietly. "Izzy felt that like everyone else did – the difference was that she realized then that you'd felt the same every minute of every day when you were at… at Azkaban. It was just then that she realized how bad it really was."

"Oh," Sirius heard himself mumble before silence filled the room for several seconds.

He'd never considered that… not really. He hadn't known he was a father until he'd been set free and, by then, his daughter had seemed just perfectly delighted with having him around. The thought of what she might have thought about his incarceration before then hadn't really occurred to him…

"I… I didn't think…" he confessed, pausing again and imagining just how scared his daughter would have been, faced with the Dementor's aura – she would have been… what? Eleven by then? "They didn't hover that close at… well, _there_. Not usually," he told his wife as his brains started working again. "There were plenty of them but they rarely got any closer than a hundred feet from prisoners. It… it's bad but not as bad as she would have felt with one in the compartment next-door."

Mia nodded, her face expressionless. "That's what I told her but she was just… a mess, you know? It was the shock. She knew it was bad – I'd told her and Harry about it by the time I was told there would be Dementors guarding Hogwarts. I didn't want them to be completely off-guard. But hearing it is a whole different thing from feeling it."

Sirius nodded heavily in return. "Merlin, there were just a bunch of kids here in the train. Bloody faceless bastards just couldn't leave'em alone, could they?" he said though his teeth, his tone lethal.

His wife looked down as she spoke. "Dumbledore said they were attracted by Harry's… well, Harry's bad experiences." She paused and shook her head – she didn't want to talk about it anymore. "It was a long time ago, Sirius – they were shaken up for a while but it passed. Remus taught Harry the Patronus charm and Izzy just did all she could to stay away from Dementors. Everything turned out fine. I shouldn't have mentioned it in the first place, Sirius. I know it's not easy for you to remember how it was like with them…"

"No, it's fine," he said, his tone back to normal, receiving a doubtful look in return. "Really, it is. _Now _it is. Like you said, it was a long time ago, love." He sighed. "It's not the best thing in the world to hear it being mentioned but it's not like I can't handle it." He gave her a smile, even if faint, before leaning back against his seat again. That seemed to soften her uncertainty just a little.

His wife looked at him for several seconds. Just looked, her eyes rather intense as she did so, until she finally uttered any words. "You keep amazing me, you know?" Mia confessed softly without really thinking. "Every single day."

Sirius raised his eyebrows at her. "Amaze you about what, love?"

She sighed. "The way you bounced back from… everything you've gone through… Azkaban, the Dementors, being on the run… You deal with it every day and, Merlin, sometimes even joke about it… I don't know how you do it."

He shrugged. "That's just who I am, Mia. Joking is, well, part of me. Between doing that and dwelling in the past in order to deal with it, I knew that joking was the only choice I had that I wouldn't make me waste any more time than I'd already lost. And wasting more time dwelling would just be a really stupid way to start living the life with you, with our family that I'd spent so long waiting for," he told her. "Time and life are the two things you can't ever get back after wasting them."

Mia smiled a little. He'd done it for her, for all of them – she knew it already but hearing it was so much more… powerful. Most people wouldn't have been able to do it – they would have changed so much that essentially they would have become somebody else. That was what she'd feared the most throughout those years waiting, especially the last one with all the articles, all the rumours and all the incidents surrounding Sirius's escape. She'd feared that he wasn't still him anymore. But in the end of all, he was and, Merlin, she loved him even more for it. "You know," she observed casually, "you're a much more rational person than most people give you credit for."

He grinned a little cockily. "That's sort of the point. If I told the world about all my qualities, I'm afraid I'd constantly be harassed by tramps wishing to be Mrs. Black instead of you," he pointed out jokingly. "As I said before, I'm quite the catch."

Mia rolled her eyes, fighting hard not to chuckle – typical Sirius to use that as a teasing theme. And to find such a smooth way to change the conversation's topic. "And as I've told you many times already, not for your modesty, for sure," she pointed out. She reached for the magazine she'd been reading and opened it again, pretending to be more interested in it than in what he was going to say.

"Who needs modesty, love?" he asked, amused at how hard she seemed to be fighting to keep a straight look on her face. "And speaking of modesty… or lack of it, I can't help noticing that this is actually the first time the two of us have had a compartment _all_ to ourselves…"

"Is that right?" she replied, forcing an uninterested tone into her voice.

Sirius nodded. "Very right," he stated. "I always ended up sitting with the guys and you with Lily and Elizabeth. Makes me wonder about all the… hum, compartment-related experiences we missed out on… Shame on us. Remember we always had to sneak into the luggage compartment to…?"

"No," Mia said calmly, her eyes on the magazine as she spoke.

He looked at her, confused. "What do you mean 'no'? We always made up excuses to leave the compartments and would meet at the luggage compartment… there was even this one time before we were together – you know, during that whole we-snog-but-we're-just-friends phase – when I got this huge bump in my head 'cause a trunk fell on me…"

"I wasn't referring to that," Mia clarified. "I meant 'no' as in '_no, just because we have a compartment all to ourselves it doesn't mean we're going to make up in this single journey for all the snogging we didn't have the chance to do back when we were teenagers_'."

He narrowed his eyes. "How can you possibly know what I was thinking of suggesting?"

Mia gave him a sceptical look over the magazine. "We've been together since we were seventeen. You honestly think I don't know how that perverted head of yours works? We're in a public place, for Merlin's sake – a student could pop by at any moment and see us all over each other."

Funny how none of the reasons she'd given against them snogging had anything to do with her being personally opposed to it… "That's what locks and blinders are for," he pointed out hopefully.

"There are no locks or blinders in these compartments, Sirius."

He smirked at her as he got up and reached for the wand in his pocket, pointing it at the sliding door. A few rays of light shot from the tip of his wand and suddenly shades appeared, covering every glass surface between them and the train's aisle, at the same time an inexistent lock clicked. "Just look at that – now there are. Must be magic…" he told her in a joking tone. That time, instead of sitting opposite her, he sat right by her side, his arm sliding over her shoulders as he smiled at her charmingly, looking at her sideways.

"You're unbelievable," she told him, shaking her head as she glanced at him just for a moment.

His grin widened and he reached for her ear with his lips. "Yes, I love you too," he whispered.

Because he wasn't looking at her face at the moment, she allowed herself to smile openly that time. "Do you mind? I'm reading a rather interesting article about the newfound discoveries on the Goblin rebellions. Apparently, there's evidence of the house-elves being allied with the Goblins in several battles," she told him flatly, not bothering to hide that fact that she was playing difficult.

"Hum, hum, I'm sure it's bloody fascinating," he told her as his lips moved an inch closer to her mouth and he kissed the side of her jaw.

"It is – I might just include it in my next quiz to the sixth years," she pointed out as it got increasingly difficult to pretend not to be interested in what Sirius was doing with him distracting her like. She mentally cursed her weak self for not being able to resist that man.

Sirius groaned. Merlin, she was good at playing the frigid shrew when she wanted to. "Love, you won't be making any quizzes for another two months and a half. I'd sure theres plenty of time to think of that. later," he told her as he planted a kiss even closer to her mouth. This time, he did feel her shiver over it.

"Now, Sirius, planning ahead always plays off, doesn't…hey!" she complained as he grabbed a hold of her magazine and threw it at the seat opposite them. "I was reading that."

"No, you weren't," he replied, narrowing his eyes. "You were just torturing me. I'm starting to believe you get a kick out of it."

"Maybe I do," she told him defiantly, letting him see her smile that time. She glanced at his lips, three or four inches away from hers and then at his eyes again. _Ah, well_, she thought_, why should I keep resisting?_ "But I think I'm gonna stop now."

"Well then…" he said, leaning even closer until their lips were so close he felt the heat of her skin caressing his own. But then, just as he noticed Mia was holding her breath expectantly, he tipped his face to the left and teasingly missed her lips by millimetres when he finally kissed her. "Maybe it's my turn to torture you in return?"

"Don't you dare," she warned, catching his face with both of her hands, cupping it firmly. "Just snog me already."

He grinned and grabbed a hold of her forearms, shifting her left hand to his side and the right one to his lips. "Not so nice when you're in the other end of it, is it?" he said after kissing the back of her hand. He placed it on his side too and then he moved his own to the back of her neck, pulling her towards him until their lips actually met that time.

He felt her smiling against his mouth as if she was thinking 'finally' and she rested a hand on his shoulder before letting herself be pulled into a more comfortable position on his lap.

Yet, before they could go any further, the eternal curse of interruption stroke again through a knock on their sliding door. Their lips parted almost immediately but they didn't quite pull away from each other immediately.

"Maybe they'll go away," Sirius whispered hopefully.

"It could be important," she murmured, motioning to get up, only to be pulled back by her husband. "Sirius!"

"If whoever it is goes away, it can't be that important," he pointed out.

But he wasn't so lucky. Another knock came, that one followed by a familiar voice. "_Aunt_ _Mia? Sirius? Are you there_?"

_Harry,_ Mia concluded. "Just a second," she shouted, that time really sliding down from Sirius's lap and onto the seat. "Go open it," she told him, already brushing her hair with her fingers, trying to cover any mess made midst the snogging.

Annoyed over his godson's lack of sense of opportunity, Sirius stood up and reached for the door, removing the locking charm and sliding it open. Harry was standing on the other side of it, a strange look on his face as he looked at him.

"What were the shades for?" he blurted out.

_Damn__, he had to ask, _Sirius thought. "Er… the morning sun. It was hitting us right on the face – it was annoying your godmother," he lied quickly.

Despite the fact that the sky was solidly covered with grey clouds, Harry made a colossal effort to convince himself his godfather was telling him the truth. Because he really, _really_, didn't want to think of what other reasons his godparents had to be locked behind a shaded door…

"So…" Sirius started, "is there something you need, kid?"

"Er, I actually wanted to talk to the two of you about something," he mumbled, glancing into the compartment and seeing his godmother quickly flipping through some magazine's pages, trying unsuccessfully to seem occupied – she'd never been any good at acting as far as Harry could remember.

He swallowed hard – what he had to say was important, really important. But, Merlin, did he feel awkward at the moment… He supposed putting it off for a day or two wouldn't harm anyone. "You know what? I could probably leave it for another time if you're busy," he declared, taking a step back. "I'll just go…"

"Oh, no you're not," Sirius told him, grabbing his godson by the arm and pulling him into the compartment. "If you're here, you might as well say what you have to say." The mood between him and Mia was broken, anyway…

"Er… okay," he said, seeing as he didn't really have another choice. Maybe it was for the best he just let that out then. "Can you…" he gestured to the door stiffly "…silence it?"

Harry not wanting to risk anyone listening to their conversation could only mean one thing – it was Voldemort-related, Sirius concluded. Maybe that strange look on his godson's face hadn't just been caused by the embarrassing situation he'd just walked into, after all.

"What is it, Harry?" Mia asked softly as the younger boy sat opposite her in the compartment.

He bit his lip as he looked at her. Any feeling of awkwardness he'd had before was replaced by the nerves of the impending conversation. He'd spent days wondering about how to tell them what he'd already told Ginny – his plans for the following year – and hadn't reached any conclusions worth noting.

He just had no idea where to start. _By the beginning, _Ginny had told him in the previous night when they'd snuck to the common room just after midnight to spend some time together, away from prying eyes. _Yeah right,_ he thought. He couldn't even tell the beginning apart from the end of it. Wherever he started, he knew what he was about to say would, at the very least, leave his godparents, Mia especially, shaken up.

"Kid, are you alright?" Sirius asked, observing his godson as he sat by his wife's side. "You look a bit pasty there."

"Hum? I'm fine," he said dismissively.

"What's this about, Harry?" Mia inquired uncertainly, looking at him concernedly. "You're starting to worry me. Did you find something new? About Voldemort? Or the Horcruxes?"

He shook his head. "No, no. It's none of that. Well, nothing new, I mean."

"Then what is it?" she insisted.

Harry took a deep breath before speaking. "It's about next year. What I'm going to do then."

"Oh, is this about those rumours that have been going around about the school maybe closing?" his godmother asked, allowing herself to feel relieved for a moment, considering that it might be such a simple matter. "Because those are just rumours. Neither Minerva nor the Ministry have any plans not to have the school open next year."

He shook his head and sighed. There was no other way of saying it – he'd just have to be blunt… "I know the school is opening – but I won't be coming back."

A moment of heavy, uncomfortable silence formed in the compartment just as those words left his mouth. Harry couldn't bring himself to look at their faces, read their thoughts through them, so he just looked out the window, pretending to be paying attention to the moving landscape of the Scottish countryside.

He suddenly wished Ginny was there – everything always felt so much clearer and easier around her. When they'd talked in the previous night and he'd mulled over how he would break the news to his godparents, she'd offered to go with him – it shouldn't be hard to meet him under his invisibility cloak. Yet he had refused. Maybe he was being a pigheaded prat – her words, not his – but it didn't feel right to bring her into it. He had a feeling that the conversation in question was something he should do on his own, even if with her around he was sure the whole thing would have felt a lot less tense to him.

"Hum, Harry?" Sirius started, making his godson finally look away from the window. "What exactly do you mean by '_I won't be coming back'_?" He wasn't dumb – he knew what it meant. Still, the implications of that statement went farther than his head could process at the moment. He needed to hear it from Harry and, he was sure, so did Mia. It just took a look at her to see that she was dumbstruck too.

"I… I meant just that," he said hesitantly. "I'm not coming back to Hogwarts next year." What else could he say now?

"Why not?" Mia managed to ask, her voice low and stunned like she was still trying to digest what he'd just said.

Harry let out a breath before speaking. "Because… because I can't just stand it anymore. Being at Hogwarts and doing _nothing_ when people are getting hurt and killed all over the country because of Voldemort's ambition. I just can't."

"You know you're not to blame for what's happening," Sirius told him immediately. "We've told you a million times already. Voldemort was an evil son of a bitch long before you were born. Long before any prophecy about you was made."

His godson nodded. "I know that. I know. Not all Voldemort is doing is my fault – he does most of it because he's mad and thirsty for power. I get your point. But you heard the prophecy: I'm the _only one_ who can stop him. And if I choose not to do anything about it, it _will_ be my fault that people keep dying."

"You're sixteen, Harry!" Mia told him, her tone much louder and edgier than before. "No one can blame you for not doing more than you're already doing."

"I'll be seventeen in less than two months," he told her immediately. "And it doesn't matter how old I am. Dumbledore is dead. _Gone._ The person Voldemort feared the most is out of the equation now – how long do you think it will take before he makes a big move? Arranges for a full-blown attack and tries to take over the Wizarding World? Maybe even the Muggle one too. It's just a matter of time – now or never. I can't ignore that."

"Don't you think there are plenty of people expecting that already?" Sirius inquired. "Merlin, that's all Mad-Eye talks about at the Order. Imminent attack this, ministry takeover that, spies everywhere… Believe me, we all see that coming and we're all ready to fight, kid."

"And so am I," Harry replied.

"So that's what are you planning to do then, Harry?" Mia asked in disbelief. "To join the front-lines?"

"I am but not in the way you're thinking," he replied. "Dumbledore gave me a mission…"

"A mission? He told you he wanted you to follow a mission for him?" she inquired. Had the man been withholding information from them again? It was unbelievable. Unbelievable! "And he didn't tell us anything?"

He shook his head. "He didn't say it in so many words. But I know that's what he wanted… no, what he _knew_ I had to do. I've got to go out there, follow every clue that leads me closer to the Horcruxes, find them and destroy them."

"The horcruxes?" Sirius asked. "They're the mission Dumbledore had for you? Hunting them down?"

Harry nodded. "It makes sense – he told me about them for a reason. Showed me memories of Voldemort'spast to give me pointers to find the four ones out there – even led me to find out exactly what one was: Nagini, Voldemort's pet snake. He knew none of this will go away if _I_ don't make it go away. For that, I have to find the Horcruxes and have them and then Voldemort destroyed. If I don't, who knows, ten years from now the Wizarding world will be hell on earth." And that, he thought, wasn't a world where he'd want anyone he cared for living. Where he'd want Alex or Mary or even his newfound cousin, Quinn, growing up. "Who knows who of all the people we know will be gone by then?"

"But Harry you can't just…" Mia started.

He shook his head and sighed before looking alternately at Sirius and Mia's eyes. "I know you don't like this plan. And I know you want to change my mind – maybe you'll say something or do something that will succeed. But you've got to know that I'll never be able to look myself in the mirror for the rest of my life if I know I stood idly by as all of this happened, as people died all over. And I'll never… ever forgive either of you if I know you were the ones who made me do it – who made me stay behind like a coward."

His words were like a slap on their faces and Harry regretted using them almost immediately, faced with the pain in their expressions, mainly Mia's. He hated being the one that had caused that… He hated he'd needed to have that conversation in the first place.

Still, that last crushing sentence, as harsh as it was, ended up being the main factor behind making them realize just how important that 'mission' was to their godson. How vital it was that they gave him a nod of approval on it, no matter how much they might hate it. That was what Harry had to do – they'd known it ever since they'd heard about the prophecy. Seeing it right in the horizon though, becoming more and more real was a different thing – much harder to accept than it in theory, logics be damned.

The whole tone of the conversation changed entirely from then on.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean that," Harry mumbled, looking down, ashamed.

"Yes, you did, Harry," Mia whispered softly. "You meant it and even though it's hard to swallow, you're right. You are."

"Aunt Mia…"

"We love you," she said before he could say anything else. "We want you to be safe. But that doesn't give us the right to make you miserable by keeping you away from the battles you have to fight in order to live with yourself," she said before chuckling dryly, looking away from him. "I've been telling that to Mad-Eye for weeks and it seems I failed to see it myself." Her eyes met his again. "I'm sorry, Harry."

"No, don't apologise. I was too harsh. I had no right to accuse you…"

"You didn't accuse us of anything, Kid," Sirius let him now. "If I was in your shoes, I would resent us too for the same reasons and you can bet your arse I would have said much worse than that."

Despite his godfather's reassurance, Harry still felt bad from what he'd said. He'd never done anything like that before, lashed at Mia or Sirius. He'd never had a reason to.

"So…" Mia started, trying to sound as calm as she could about it – just because she was willing to go along with Harry's plan, it didn't mean she liked it or even felt okay about it. "When are you planning to start that…hunt?"

"Just after my birthday," he told them. "I'll have the trace on me until then – I won't be of much use until it's gone. I'd thought of leaving right on my birthday but Ginny made me promise I'd stay for Bill and Fleur's wedding at least."

"Ginny knows?" she asked, surprised.

He nodded. "I had the tell her. She wasn't surprised – knew it was coming for a while, actually. She had it all thought out by the time I told her and is already planning to join me just as soon as she turns seventeen too." He sighed and looked them in the eyes. "I understand this is hard for you – letting me just… go on this thing. I do understand. I don't want Ginny anywhere near this mess either. I just want her to be safe – that's why I'm hoping this will all be over by the time she turns seventeen so she won't have to go after me. I suppose that gives me a year or so to deal with it."

"Wait, you're not planning on going on this Horcrux hunt all alone, are you?" Sirius asked him with eyes narrowed. "Because, I'm sorry, Kid, but that's too… mad for us to even try and accept it."

Mia nodded. "Yes, Harry. Horcuxes are dangerous – too dangerous for you to handle all on your own. You need someone by your side – listen, maybe one of us could go with you and…"

"No, no way," he replied immediately. "You've got to stay or at home – I won't be going alone, anyway. Ron and Hermione are coming with me – they all set on it already and I can't change their minds." Honestly, he selfishly didn't really want to either – they'd been in it together from the beginning and deep down he'd always known they would remain that way right up until the end.

"Still even if they're going, we could…" Mia tried again.

"_No,_" he said firmly. "You've got to stay at home. Both of you. For Izzy, Alex, Mary… they need you."

"And you don't?" Sirius asked in return.

"Not as much as they do. Not anymore," Harry replied honestly. "I've been getting ready for this for a long time. Dumbledore taught me all he could to make sure I would succeed and Ron and Hermione have been in it too, ever since our first year. We'll manage together. We always do." Then, hopefully it would all be over. He would have a normal life, finally, as would everyone else.

Silence came again, though that time it wasn't as uncomfortable as it had been before.

It was true, Mia knew. All of it. In a few weeks he would legally be an adult but he hadn't been a child for a long time then, even if she so badly had tried to keep him one for as long as she could. Boys his age should be worrying about what to give their girlfriends for their birthday or whether or not they would have enough NEWTs to follow their career of choice – instead, Harry worried about a dark lord who'd marked him as someone who should be killed when he was a mere baby. He hadn't needed her or Sirius to solve his problems for a while and had taken matters in his own hands various times in what came to threats to himself, his loved ones or even the Wizarding World, almost always with his best friends by his side.

Logically, if there was any group of teenagers ready to face a challenge like that one, it was them. Yet it didn't make it taste a little less sour in Mia's mouth. It was hard letting a child go, especially when the reason why she had to do it was so haunted with danger. But she had to do it anyway.

"When did this happen?" she asked him. "When you become this… grown person and stopped being the little boy who helped his baby sister steal her grandmother's broom to teach her how to fly thinking I wouldn't find out? It seems like it was just a minute ago."

Harry's lips curled at the memories. "I don't know. That must have been a really long minute."

"I wish it had been longer," she whispered. Her eyes felt heavy and not in a sleepy sort of way but in a close-to-tears one. She couldn't break down in front of Harry – he didn't need that. Tears would have to wait – she hated knowing that she'd been crying way too much lately. If only she could invoke hormones as an excuse like she'd been able to six months before when she was carrying Mary…

She felt Sirius's hand touching her arm and knew immediately he was trying to give her some sort of comfort. He'd been quiet for the last few minutes and didn't seem to have any intention of re-entering the conversation anytime soon. He understood that moment was between her and Harry.

Mia stood up, then and opened up her arms to him. Harry understood the gesture and got up too, letting her envelop him in a hug freely. He was practically taller than she was – she'd noticed that already but it still felt odd in comparison to the little boy who felt very proud of himself for finally reaching his godmother's waist height.

"Does this mean you're okay with me not coming back to Hogwarts to chase the Horcruxes?" he asked tentatively.

"No," she replied, letting him pull away from her hold. "It means I hate that you have to go through this. But also that if this is what you need to do, I'll respect it."

"I suppose that's all I can ask for," he offered.

"But you've got to promise me something."

Harry nodded. "Okay."

"Don't take more risks than you really have to," his godmother requested. "I don't want to be one of those people who have to bury a child too soon."

The pure thought sent a shiver down his spine. "I don't want to be one of those people who get buried way too soon."

Mia smiled a little at his response but her eyes were still close to tears. She sat back but Harry remained on his feet and turned to Sirius.

"What about you? Are you okay with this?"

"Not really. But just as long as you come back to tell the story, Kid, I'm not terribly opposed to it," Sirius informed him. "Only don't forget we've still got more than a month before it's time to say farewell. Don't think we won't make sure you're ready before you go. We'll go back to this later."

His godson gave him a nod. "Wouldn't have it any other way," he stated before gesturing towards the sliding door. "I should go… Before hum… Ron and Hermione start arguing again and strangle each other to death," he said lamely. "I sort of need them more than ever now…"

They nodded understandingly and Harry quickly made an exit. By the time he closed the door behind him, Mia was already biting her lower lip as the first tear escaped.

By her side, Sirius only needed a look to know she was about to break down – she needed to vent, to cry and maybe even yell and punch before starting to rationalize. She was more than entitled to it, after all.

It killed her to allow Harry to go on that mission, yet she'd given him the closest thing she had to a blessing because she knew Harry needed it. Because it was the right thing to do. Sirius had never admired his wife more than he did at that moment and, as far as he was concerned, he would do all he could to make it easier on her. "Come here," he said, opening his arms welcomingly at her.

She slid into his arms and he brought her to his lap without a second thought. That time, he didn't kiss her as before – he simply held her close and stroke her hair as she buried her face against his neck and let the tears fall for several minutes.

"I knew it," he heard her murmur against his neck at some point. "I knew from the moment I first held that boy that he would break my heart someday."

He combed her hair with his finger again as he spoke softly. "He hasn't left yet. He won't for another month and a half."

She sobbed and pulled away a little just to look at him with red, swollen eyes. "He will – that's the point. Damn Dumbledore for giving him that insanely dangerous mission. Damn him! I don't want Harry to get hurt. He was my baby – my first baby." She buried her face in his neck again and held back a sob, sick of crying.

"Don't underestimate him, love," Sirius warned her. "The kid survived a killing curse when he was a baby and slew a basilisk at twelve years old with only a sword and a singing bird. When it comes to Harry Potter, the line between possible and impossible becomes very, very thin. You've got to count that as an advantage."

"I know, I know," she said, pulling back again and just resting the side of her head against his shoulder. "I knew this was coming – I knew it would be up to Harry in the end… I just didn't think it would have to be this soon. I don't want him to get hurt."

"He's a strong lad, Mia. If anyone can pull this off, it's him."

He hoped he was right. Merlin knew he did. Not only because he cared for the kid like he was his own or because he was his only connection to his late best mate but also for Mia.

Because, most of all, he really didn't want to find out how badly she would fall apart if anything awful happened to Harry.

**A/N2: Well, I think I've made all my ramblings in A/N1, so I'm just going to say I hope you like the chapter. It was very emotional to write...**

**Feedback is always welcome. Review!**


	35. Recipe for Disaster

**20**** June 1997**

Three days passed since the beginning of summer break and there was no prospect whatsoever of things getting even a bit close to normalcy in the house of Black that summer. Just normalcy – that wasn't asking for much, was it? Sirius wondered. Apparently it was, after Harry's game-changing declaration during the journey on the Hogwarts Express. That always seemed to be the huge elephant in the room these days…

It wasn't that the matter came up often – Harry not going back to Hogwarts in the following year – to shake things up. In fact, it was just the other way around: it hadn't been spoken of _at all_ in the past three days. Or rather Mia didn't speak of it, so he and Harry didn't either.

It wasn't very much like himself to avoid speaking about something with Mia, Sirius admitted in his mind. But that was a delicate case. The way she'd broken down in the train when Harry had first told them had left him worried and, since she wasn't talking about it in the first place, letting the matter cool down in her head for a few days before bringing it up again had seemed like a good idea to Sirius at first.

Then, he'd gotten a glimpse of her expression when she thought no one was looking and changed his mind. He could practically see the gears moving inside her head as she tortured herself over and over, thinking of ways to make it all go away and to keep Harry at home, away from harm and with no resentment for them over keeping him there.

That wasn't good, not good at all. Mia dwelling uselessly and stressing herself, him and Harry just going along with it and… oh, Izzy remaining completely oblivious to all that since Harry still hadn't come around to tell her for some reason. All of it was a recipe for disaster and Sirius could just tell that if they didn't fix it soon, the whole mess would blow right up in their faces.

So, he began doing so, starting by his wife. After a quick trip to the fireplace in order to make a little floo call and put his plan into motion, he found Mia in Alex's room (who was out in a play date with young Darcy Finnigan in Wales that afternoon) seemingly folding a stack of clothes piled on her son's bed by hand, which had him raising an eyebrow – that task was not only usually done by means of magic but also belonged to Kreacher, who tended to be very territorial about his house-work. Apparently, Mia was giving the little bastard a run for his money… He swallowed back a chuckle and prepared to speak.

"This is not working," he stated, making her flinch in surprise before she turned to him.

"Merlin, Sirius, you startled me," she told him, breathless. "What's not working?"

He pointed between himself and her. "This. You avoiding talking about what the kid told us and me not pushing you to," he explained.

"I'm not… avoiding it," she said defensively, turning her attention back to the clothes-folding.

"Yes, you are, love," he told her, approaching the bed and sitting on it, observing her closely as she tried to look busy. "Usually you'd be all over this – the bother would be to get you to shut up!"

"Just because I'm not talking about it, doesn't mean I'm not thinking about it," she said without looking at him just before he pulled one of her hands into his, stopping her from what she was doing. She looked at him and sighed. "Sirius…"

"I know you're thinking of it – except you're not actually thinking, you're dwelling. And what have I said about dwelling? It's a waste of time, love, and doesn't lead you anywhere," he stated softly. "Look, you just have to talk about it with me at some point. It always gets better when we do. And this," he said, pointing between them again, meaning the way they were handling matters at the moment, "this sucks, Mia."

She sighed again and dropped the clothes this time, motioning to sit on the bed too, turning sideways to him. "I'm trying to think of a way to deal with this or, Merlin, to figure out a way to let Harry fight this war and stay safe at the same time. But I can't. I try to think of one thing and ten come and then those ten bring another ten each and then those ten each… well, you see where I'm getting."

He nodded. "You're stressed."

She sighed and nodded in return. "Yes. I suppose I am. I try to keep my mind put of it sometimes by not talking about it, being with the kids and…"

"… folding clothes," he finished for her with a chuckle. "How's that working for you?

Mia shook her head. "Not well. The thoughts keep coming and I just…" she sighed again and looked down. "I'm scared, Sirius."

He wrapped one arm around her, allowing her to rest her head on his shoulder. "So am I," he confessed. "But I bet it will be easier if we're scared together, love. And in the meanwhile, you need to relax."

"I tried, Sirius. I…"

He cleared his throat, interrupting her. "I took the liberty of calling someone to help you with that."

She pulled away just enough for him to see her narrowed eyes. "What did you do?"

He smiled at her, then. "Well, as it happens, our dear friend Elizabeth got a big cash bonus from work and is looking forward to spend every sickle of it shopping – she'd like to enlist you to help her. That said, she'll come here to pick you up in…" he checked his watch "… five minutes. That should give you time to change into something more… out-y."

She looked at him, stunned. "Five min… wait, shopping? I'm not in a mood for shopping, Sirius."

"Not just shopping – you'll be hanging out with your best friend, love. I'm sure you'll find a way to entertain yourself with that. Then, you'll come home and we'll head to the Burrow 'cause, in case you've forgotten, Molly has invited us to dinner."

"But the kids…"

"The kids will be fine with me. Alex won't be back from his play date at least until six, Mary's napping at the moment, Izzy's in deep homework-mode – which, by the way, I find very disappointing in a child of mine – and Harry's doing Merlin-knows-what somewhere," Sirius told her. "And I am deeply offended if you think I can't handle a couple of teenagers and an infant on my own."

Mia sighed. "You're not really giving me a choice, are you?"

"It's for your own good," he told her seriously before checking his watch again. "Three minutes."

"You're actually relying on Elizabeth to be here on time?" she asked sceptically before getting up, getting a shrug in return. "I suppose I should go get ready, then." Mia motioned to make her way out but stopped midway to the door. "I guess I should thank you for this. Not the shopping part – I meant the…"

"… trying to get you to stop stressing?" he guessed, receiving a nod in return and approached her. "What else am I here for? I wouldn't say no to a little kiss, though."

Mia smiled softly and covered the rest of the distance that was between them in order to place her lips softly against his. He cradled her face a few moments later, deepening the kiss into something more intense as she parted her lips to him. It was heaven for these short moments.

They pulled away a few seconds later and Mia sighed. "I need to go get ready. Elizabeth is supposed to be here in a minute."

Sirius nodded and reached to place a kiss on her forehead before letting her go. "Go on," he urged her. She did leave for their room that time and was finished with the task of getting ready only a few minutes later.

As Mia had hinted earlier, Elizabeth arrived through the floo network fifteen minutes late with some excuse about not finding the shoes she'd wanted to wear.

"I have no idea where I put them. I can't have left them at Kingsley's flat, can I?" she mumbled, more to herself than to them as she stood in their kitchen. They didn't quite pay attention to her words as their attention was on her usually long blonde hair which barely reached her shoulders that day.

"You cut your hair," Mia observed, surprised.

"Oh," Elizabeth said, smiling as she touched it. "I felt it was time for a change. You know what they say: new fiancé, new hairstyle."

"Nobody says that," Sirius point out.

She glared at him for a second. "Shut up, Sirius. Kingsley loves it still."

He chuckled in return. "How's auror Shacklebolt doing these days, anyway?"

"Very, well, thank you," she said, her lips curling before she turned to Mia. "Ready to go and wipe away that long face?"

Mia sighed. "Do I have to?"

Sirius laughed and turned to Elizabeth. "Make sure she's home by six."

The blonde rolled her eyes. "Blimey, Mr. Black, can't she get an extension to that curfew just today?" she asked, trying to mimic a teenager's tone.

"Nope." He reached for his wife and kissed her lips softly. "Have fun, love."

"We'll see about that," she mumbled under her breath before walking to the fireplace and grabbing a handful of floo powder. "Where to?" she asked Elizabeth.

"Diagon Alley, where else?" Elizabeth declared, amused at her friend's reluctance. "You go on first."

Mia did so and was gone from the room in a matter of seconds, leaving Sirius and Elizabeth alone.

"Are you going to tell me what this is all about? Her being upset enough for you to call me?" the blonde inquired.

He shook his head. "That's up to her to decide. Just cheer her up, will you? And try not to do so by getting her drunk."

Elizabeth chuckled. "I'm a respectable healer – I don't get people drunk, Sirius Black. I simply drug them." And with that, she walked to the fireplace and flooed away too, leaving Sirius alone in the kitchen, chuckling.

He stayed there for a few more minutes, sitting down while fumbling with an old newspaper containing Dumbledore's eulogy by an old friend of his, Elphias Doge, and sneaking a few of Alex's cookies from the jar, since the boy was away at the moment. No doubt he's wrestle his father for them if he was around…

A crack-like sound echoed in the room suddenly and Sirius didn't even need to turn to the source of it to know it was Kreacher. The house-elf's deep, frog-like voice sounded a few seconds later.

"Young Miss Mary be awake, Master," he announced evenly. Kreacher was fond of the Black children, so he tended to always keep an eye on them to make sure they were alright either they were awake or asleep – him warning them when the baby woke up had sort of become a habit in the house.

Sirius nodded and closed the newspaper, putting it on the kitchen table in order to get up. "I'll go check on her, thanks."

He only realized he'd thanked the house-elf midway through the stairs that led up to the ground floor and that made him feel a bit… odd. He'd be damned – the little bastard had grown on him. When had that happened? He'd spent so long detesting him over his clear allegiance to his mother in his childhood… He supposed now Kreacher had evolved into a more bearable position in his mind through his fondness for Mia and the children, either he wanted it or not – he was trying to decide if that pleased him or freaked him out. At that rate they might end up as friends in two or three years' time, he thought with a shiver.

He decided not to think of it ahead of time and reached the third floor in a few minutes, immediately hearing his youngest daughter's whimpers of protest. Just a few seconds away from full-fledged wailing, he thought as he stepped into the nursery.

The little girl lay on her cot, flaying her limbs around in annoyance as if she was angry at every living soul in the world. His Mary was a social baby, he knew, thus waking up alone was something she didn't like one bit.

She calmed down a little just as she saw her father and lay there, tears just peaking out of her brown eyes, looking up at him with an expression that almost certainly meant '_Well, what are you waiting for? Get me out of here!_'.

"You know, you're way too small to have that big of a temper, pretty," he pointed out.

Mary gave him a tiny inpatient frown in return and scrunched up her little face like she was threatening to become loud if he didn't do what she wanted soon.

"Alright, alright, no need for threats," Sirius shook his head and chuckled and reached into the cot, picking his little daughter up. Pleased, Mary gave him an appreciative coo and immediately reached for his face with a miniature hand just as he settled her against his side. "You know, I've got a feeling you're gonna be quite a handful in a few years with that temper of yours." He reached with his lips to the baby's cheek and kissed her there, making her giggle in return. She smelled like baby powder and soap. There was nothing like it.

He smiled at her, then, and marvelled just a little at how big his tiny little girl had gotten. Seemed like it was just the day before that Mia had told him about her, so freaked out he'd been about the injuries she'd suffered at the Department of Mysteries, and then there she was in his arms nearly six-months old. She was growing like a weed.

"So, little one," he told her as Mary tried to chew her entire fist at the same time, "this afternoon you're stuck with Daddy 'cause Mommy has gone out with Auntie Elizabeth. Or rather Daddy had her kidnap Mommy. In my defence, it's for her own good." Either she was paying attention to him or not, the baby girl showed him a drool-covered hand in response and, after a light chuckle, Sirius reached for a clean burping cloth hanging on one of the rocking chair's arms in order to clean it. He shoved it into his pocket afterwards, figuring it might be needed again later. "Wanna go see what Izzy and Harry are up to now?"

Sirius didn't wait for any sign of response and just walked out of the room with the baby on his arms.

He went down the stairs and quickly reached his eldest daughter's room. She was sitting at her desk, nibbling on the top of her quill in frustration as she apparently struggled with something written on likely one of the thickest books Sirius had ever seen.

He let out a breath before speaking. "I have never, _ever_ been so disappointed at you in my life, Isabelle," he said in mock outrage, startling her.

She looked at him in confusion. "What did I do?"

"More likely what _are you doing_," he corrected. "Homework in the first week of Summer Break?" He looked at Mary and gave her a serious look. "Sacrilege! Homework is something you do in the Hogwarts Express when you're riding into the new school-year."

Izzy rolled her eyes in disbelief. "You scared me there for a moment – I thought you were referring to something serious."

"It _is_ serious. Everything about me is _serious_. Pun intended, in case you're wondering," he stated, grinning as he stepped in and sat on his daughter's bed by the desk, placing little Mary on his lap on a sideways sitting position.

"Lame joke, Daddy. That's just too easy – I thought you were better than that," Izzy told him. "And for your information, I'm doing homework right now because I don't want to have to worry about it for the rest of the summer."

He clicked his tongue in disapproval. "I don't know what we've done wrong with her," he told his baby daughter, shaking his head. "Coming out so… _responsible_." He shivered visibly and made an effort to make the last word sound like some sort of disease.

"Don't start corrupting her already, Daddy, she's far too young for that," Izzy stated, reaching for her sister in order to give a little caress to the soft brown fuzz on her head, which had the baby laughing.

"I resent that you call this 'corruption'," Sirius informed her. "Anyway, what were you chewing your quill about? You sounded a bit annoyed there."

Izzy groaned and turned back to her book. "It's Ancient Runes. There's this word here I can't translate… what the hell does 'alethes' mean?"

Sirius shrugged cluelessly. "My guess would be some sort of curse word."

She rolled her eyes. "Professor Babbling wouldn't give us a _curse_-_word_ to translate, Daddy."

"Point made," he admitted, turning to Mary, who was busy trying to reach for her foot with her hand. "Any ideas from you, little one?" She simply looked at him, confused. "Yeah, me either," he responded like she'd just spoken to him.

"I can't find it anywhere in this dictionary!" Izzy said, closing the comically large book in front of her, at least four inches thick.

"Maybe you're looking on the wrong place, Izzybel," he pointed out.

"I've looked at every word starting with an A in the translation to the Latin alphabet!" she said in frustration.

"Well, maybe it doesn't start with an A. What if it has a silent H or something?" he offered.

Izzy paused and just looked at him for a few seconds. "Why didn't I think of that before?"

"Genes can only do so much passing down intelligence, love," Sirius mockingly said.

"Yeah, I guess Mom didn't pass me down everything there was to pass after all," she pointed out.

Sirius gave her an appalled look and stood up, taking the baby with him. "You know, just for that, Mary here was just bumped up to the condition of 'favourite daughter' and you down to 'problem child'. At least she doesn't talk back to her beloved father."

Izzy grinned at him in amusement. "That would be because she's yet to say her first word, Daddy."

He narrowed his eyes further. "Problem child. I think I'm leaving to somewhere where I'm more appreciated."

She waved him away, chuckling as he walked out, and opened her dictionary again to search for the word.

Sirius had to bite his lower lip to keep himself from smiling at his eldest daughter's nerve. Not that she was there to see it or anything – it was a matter of principle not to give her that satisfaction, even if unknowingly, after all… "Well, since our presence if not welcome by your sister, let's head to somewhere where we are," he told little Mary, who gave him a radiant toothless smile.

Because there was no sign of Harry in his room or the living room, Sirius decided to give the library a try. With the plans ahead of him, it was only natural the kid would try to do some research or something.

We was pleased to see he was right about his godson's whereabouts when he spotted him at the wooden reading table in the centre of the room, meddling with a book as he wrote down a bunch of stuff.

"Researching, hum?" he asked casually, making his way to the table and sitting down with Mary on his lap again, surrounding her with one arm to make sure she wouldn't slip away. She unsuccessfully tried to reach a piece of parchment on the table, likely to eat it– she just seemed like she would chew and grab anything these days… must be the approaching teething.

Harry looked up and shrugged. "Something like that," he said noncommittally.

Sirius raised his eyebrows curiously and snatched Harry's parchment without a warning.

"Hey, I was writing there!" he protested.

"Yeah, yeah," his godfather mumbled as he brought the piece of parchment closer. Little Mary tried to grab a handful of it from him and whimpered in protest when Sirius held it just out of her reach. He absently moved his leg to rock her a little in a soothing fashion and started to read. Almost immediately, he put the parchment back on the table and stared at Harry. "You've got to be kidding me. Homework? _You _are doing homework?"

Harry looked embarrassed since he knew that was the most useless thing he could possibly be doing at the moment, considering he wasn't coming back to Hogwarts. "Er… yeah."

"Is there something in this house's water that's affecting both you and Izzy? Or have you two been possessed by Hermione? Maybe even Moony. Last I checked they were both alive," he said before sighing. "No, but really, you do realize there's absolutely no sense for you to waste time with homework, right? Not when you're…" He gestured with his hand but didn't finish the sentence. Honestly, that was still a bit too fresh.

"… not going back to school?" Harry finished for him, receiving a nod in return. "I know it's stupid and waste of time but…" He paused.

"Yes?" Sirius asked.

Harry asked. "I was researching and researching and getting nowhere. It was driving me nuts, so I stopped for a while and just needed to do something… normal. Homework's normal."

Well, that _did _make sense. "I suppose that serves as a good enough excuse," Sirius admitted. "But isn't Ginny usually the one in charge of, you know…" His throat felt a bit ticklish for some reason and he coughed before continuing, "…giving you normal?"

Harry stared at him for a moment, a bit horrified. That little cough before Sirius had finished the sentence… by normal he surely didn't mean…

His expression must have mirrored exactly what he was thinking, since his godfather was quick to answer his thoughts. "Not _that_ sort of normal!" Sirius called quickly. "I mean normal as in _normal_. Dictionary normal. Not _that._ If your normal involves that normal, well, that's your business – awkward enough last time we talked about… normal in your fourth year. Though I supposed if you really, really needed to talk about it…"

"I think I lost you by the fourth time you said 'normal'," Harry pointed out, embarrassed enough by the less current meaning Sirius had given to the word 'normal'. Merlin, he just had too much of a mess in his life to even worry about it… The closest he and Ginny had gotten there was maybe a little feeling up after a particularly hassling Quidditch game – honestly, it seemed right to save _that_ for when things were more certain. For when he wouldn't have to worry if he's make it through the year…

"Good – let's just forget about my mad ramblings, shall we?" Sirius suggested. "I meant that I thought Ginny was in charge of keeping things… as ordinary as possible for you. You know, as well as being a girlfriend, helping with research, yada, yada."

"Oh, right, that," Harry said. "Sure, yeah."

"Then why are you here doing literally useless homework to fill your ordinary-need when you could just be with her doing the same. No offense to…" he paused in order to see what subject Harry was covering in what seemed to be an essay, once again keeping the piece of parchment out of Mary's reach "…transfiguration or anything but Ginny sure is more pleasant to spend time with than homework."

"Well, yeah. Usually," Harry agreed. "But she… hum… Mrs. Weasley's making her help with the details for Bill and Fleur's wedding. Don't get me wrong, I love her. I'd jump in front of a curse aimed for her without a second thought but…"

"… the wedding planning is too much for you to handle," Sirius guessed easily.

Harry swallowed hard and nodded. "It's not like it's gonna kill her or anything… Plus, it's a girl thing, I guess."

Sirius chuckled. "You keep thinking that, kid. It's gonna come back to bite you in the arse at some point."

Harry looked at him in confusion but didn't press the matter any further. He actually had something else in a much more serious tone to ask his godfather. "I'll take your word for it. So, hum, there's something I need to… It has nothing to do with this: Ginny or… Well, I just needed to know: how's aunt Mia handling this whole… thing with me going away? She hasn't said a word about it since the train."

Sirius sighed, shifting Mary so she was resting against his chest, her little head resting against it as she sucked her thumb – hearing his heartbeat seemed to be enough to entertain her. "I know – I'm working on it, kid. Trust me. She's been a bit stressed because of it – we can't blame her, can we? It's a lot to take in for someone who raised you since you were very little. Part of her still sees you as her little boy."

Harry nodded silently. "I figured it would be the hardest on her… But I had to tell you two. I couldn't just… disappear one day."

"Of course not. No one's questioning that, kid," Sirius told him. "If you just vanished without a warning… well, you'd be grounded for the rest of your life just as soon as we laid our eyes on you again. Trust me, it wouldn't be pretty."

Harry had to chuckle. "I imagine it wouldn't."

"But, really listen, kid," Sirius told him. "Do you think you're really ready for this? To go out just with Ron and Hermione and hunt down Horcruxes?"

He sighed. "Honestly, not completely. But I don't think anyone would ever be able to say with full certainty that they're ready for something like this. Dumbledore trained me for it, though – that's something I doubt anybody else can say."

"And is it enough?" Sirius asked.

"It has to be," Harry told him.

His godfather sighed – he had a point in a way. Apart from Voldemort himself, Dumbledore must have been the one person on Earth who knew more than just bits and pieces about Horcruxes. The next question Sirius asked had actually been in his mind for a few days – he knew it was just too easy to actually work but he had to ask. "Any chance you can do it from home? Still live here and apparate around… You know what I mean."

There was a pause after the question. It lasted just a moment. "I thought of that. I did, for your sake. And I concluded something: maybe I might," Harry confessed. "Speaking in theory, I might. But when it comes to reality… tell me something: how would you feel if one day I got too caught up chasing a lead and didn't make it back home? Maybe even for days. What would aunt Mia do?"

"Freak out," Sirius replied immediately. What else? He knew he would freak out too.

Harry nodded. "Exactly. And I can't do that. I can't deal with that. I can't be half at home, half out there. I need to do this in my own pace and if I stay at home, I'll always feel like I owe it to you to show every day just to point out that I'm alive, which may very well not be possible. It would get in the way and it would be dangerous to you – if he finds out I'm hunting his horcruxes, he'll come after me with all he had and the first thing he'll is strike my base if I have one. I know the house is protected but how sure are you that he won't find a way around it? I can't do that to you or to myself."

Sirius sighed as he rubbed his baby's back. "You sure thought that through."

"I had a long time to think," Harry replied. "I figured you and Mia would think of that too. I can't stay but I can promise you, though, that I'll find a way to let you know sometimes that I'm fine. I owe that much to you."

Sirius nodded. "I suppose I can't really ask for more than that after you made that point. It did sound too easy if you just used home as a base… You're taking the two-way mirror with you, though – no discussion. And we'll have to work on a few handy spells, though. You never know what comes up."

"But the trace…"

His godfather shrugged. "Phew, with all the wards around this house, the guys at the ministry probably wouldn't be able to tell if half of it blew up, let alone that an underage wizard used magic. Did it loads of times when I was your age – how do you think I managed to run away from here?"

Strangelly, that made sense. "I'd never thought of that," Harry admitted.

"Yeah, well, I figured Mia wouldn't like to have you casting spells left and right here in the house," Sirius told him sheepishly. "Let's just keep quiet about it, okay? She'll have my hide if this becomes common knowledge. I'm sure little ears won't tell," he said, nodding at Mary, sitting her back on his lap again. "But, well, do we have an agreement? Let me make sure you know what you're doing before you go? If anything, for your godmother's peace of mind."

"I'm always open to learning new spells," Harry said easily. "Especially defence ones. You really don't have to ask twice."

Sirius offered him his hand to shake and Harry accepted it firmly. "It's a deal, then," his godfather declared.

"A deal."

Sirius cleared his threat. "Now that we have this out of the way and since we're already on this matter… I've been wondering… when are you planning to tell Izzy?"

He looked at Sirius in confusion. "Tell her about what?"

He gave his godson a strange look. "About those plans for next year. What else are we talking about? It's a bit awkward that she'd the only one here at home that doesn't know, isn't it?"

There as a slight pause in the conversation, during which only Mary cooed and flung one of her pudgy arms against the table.

"You are planning to tell her, right?" Sirius inquired uncertainly.

"I forgot," Harry mumbled in a low tone, half disbelieving.

"Hum?"

"I completely forgot to tell her," he said. "I was planning to do right after I told you. But then you two reacted so… complicatedly. I figured I could only handle an explanation a day and left it to the day before yesterday. But then…"

"… you forgot?" Sirius asked in disbelief. "You _actually_ forgot? As in it passed your mind."

He nodded, feeling stupid. How was that even possible? He thought. All there had been in his mind for the past three days was the Horcrux Hunt, the preparations, research… And how many times had he run into his sister in that house? He only needed to sum two and two in order for the thought 'hey, maybe I should let her in into this little secret' to form in his head. But he hadn't. The whole 'I forgot' thing just sounded like a really bad excuse, honestly… And the worst part was that it wasn't one.

Sirius sighed. "Harry, you'd better get it done soon. If she finds out another way, she's gonna…"

"_Who's gonna find out what another way?_" they heard a familiar voice asking, which revealed itself to be Izzy's herself as they turned to face the door.

They just stared at her for a few seconds as Mary squirmed around in her father's lap. That was _not _happening. It was too much of a coincidence she had to walk in right then… But then again, many said there was no such thing as coincidences. If that some scheme plotted by some higher power playing them like chess pawns, neither Harry nor Sirius felt too happy with it.

"Izzybel," Sirius said, awkwardly. "Finished homework already?"

She nodded. "Just did."

"Hum," he mumbled. "So… er, did you end up finding out what that word meant? A… abe…"

"It was _halethes_. It did have ah H," Izzy provided, raising an eyebrow. "And I did – it meant 'truth'."

He stared some more. Truth. _Come on!_ Sirius thought. That _was _a bloody long stretch of fate… He turned to Harry, who sat unmoving and silently praying she wouldn't take offence in his… forgetfulness.

"So, what were you talking about?" she insisted. "Or is it some big male secret you can't share with me? If that's the case, I'm taking Mary with me. If I can't hear it, neither can she."

"Er… actually, hum, it's none of that," Harry started nervously. "Have a seat, Izzy."

She looked at him suspiciously, knowing that sentence usually wasn't the start to anything good. "Who's dying?" she asked immediately as she approached the table and sat by her father's side, unceremoniously pulling her little sister from her father's lap into her own. Mary squealed happily and started fumbling with the tips of Izzy's long hair.

"What? No one's dying," Harry said immediately. "Hopefully, I mean."

Sirius frowned. "Don't even joke about it, kid," he warned his godson in an unlikely stern tone.

"Not joking," Harry replied.

Izzy cleared her throat. "Get to the point, please? _Really_ to the point."

Harry nearly protested but stopped himself. She was right; he needed to get to the point. There was no use dancing around the matter – at least not with her. He'd known Izzy literally since the day she was born and he was pretty sure she didn't need to be eased into it. With a sigh, he spoke. _Just rip it like a Muggle plaster. _"I'm leaving this August. I'm going to hunt the Horcruxes with Ron and Hermione."

She didn't flinch or speak or react in any sort of way, she just looked while her baby sister played with her hands on her lap.

Sirius observed his daughter for a long moment before speaking, taken aback by his daughter's apparently apathetic reaction to Harry's bluntness. "Izzybel? Are you okay?" he inquired.

She ignored her father's question. "How long have you been planning this?" she asked in a serene tone like she wasn't surprised.

"A while. Ever since Dumbledore…" Harry didn't finish saying that, letting her fill the blank on her own.

"A few weeks, then," she summed up.

He nodded silently.

She nodded in return before speaking, her voice taking a heavier tone, then. "And Ron and Hermione know, obviously," she concluded. "Clearly Dad as well and probably Mom too. I won't even ask about Ginny. Maybe even a few of the Weasleys through Ron, too?"

"Er… yeah," he said. "Yeah, they all know. I mean, I'm not sure if Ron has mentioned it to his parents yet, but the rest… We're mostly trying to keep it in a trustful group. So, yeah, they know."

"They all do – isn't it great?" she asked in an all too cheery tone. Mary apparently didn't like it as she squirmed uncomfortably on her sister's lap.

Harry looked at her, now free of the nerves behind breaking the news. "Is there something you want to say, Izzy?"

"Me? Oh, nothing," she said, not bothering to sound truthful while she absently passed Mary back to her father's arms.

"Izzybel…" Sirius started as he cradled the baby.

"_Nothing_ at all," Izzy continued.

"Doesn't sound like it," Harry informed her.

"Doesn't it? I have nothing to say just as I didn't when I figured you, Ron and Hermione had were plotting something for the past few days. And when I figured Ginny was in it too. Because I imagined it mustn't be _that_ important or my _brother _wouldn't completely keep me out of it."

Harry sighed. "I didn't keep you out of it – I've just told you, Izzy!"

"Yeah, you've _just _told me!" she said back, this time shouting. "After you figured it all out, decided every bloody detail, date and time of when you're leaving. You're just informing me – might as well send me a memo and be done with it!"

Feeling one too many there, Sirius stood up – something told him that interfering in their squabble or whatever that tense exchange or words could be called would just make it worse for one or both sides and that was what he'd do if he just stayed there longer. He was sure that anything he might say would just fuel his daughter's rage further. And, honeatly, he didn't really want Mary to be right in the middle of the shouting. "You know what? I think Mary is not in a library mood, are you, princess?" he said, looking at the baby, who buried her little face on the crook of his neck, not pleased with the shouting. "You two vent what you have to vent but if you jump at each other's throats, you're grounded," he warned them without a hint of humour in his voice. "I'll be right outside."

Neither Harry nor Izzy seemed to react to what he said but he knew they'd heard him – with that, he walked out and stood right by the door, walking back and forth to soothe the annoyed baby. From inside the library, their voices came loud enough for him to hear without any magical-aid but not too much to upset Mary further.

"_I just didn't tell you before because I didn't want you to have to keep it from your parents_," Harry's voice came.

"_Oh, come on! I'm a big girl – I can decide that on my own. Besides, if you asked me to keep a secret, even if that secret was that you'd robbed Gringotts or something, I would have kept it for you. I would have told you to tell them but I wouldn't have breathed a word if you didn't want me to! That's what friends do and just because I'm as good as your sister, it doesn't mean that I'm less of a friend – you used to know that!_"

"_I know that!_"

"_Oh, really? Then why am I always the _last one_ to know?"_

"_To know what?"_

"_Everything that matters! Remember the prophecy? You found out with Mom and Dad, then you told Ginny, Ron, Hermione and finally, like days later, who? Me! The Horcruxes: Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Mom, Dad and who again? Me! And now, surprise, surprise, who's the last one to know of your plans to play hero yet another time? And who didn't take any part in helping you with them because of that? ME! I am _always _the last one to find out!"_

"_No, you're not. Most people don't even have any idea of any of that, Izzy,"_ Harry tried to plead.

"_Most people haven't been your friends since they were in diapers! Most people weren't your only friends for practically a decade!"_

The case wasn't good for any, Sirius thought. Maybe Izzy was being overdramatic but she had a point – it had to sting, knowing she was the last one to know. Again and again. "This one's sticky, Mary," he mumbled to the little girl in his arms, who appeared to be getting sleepy.

"_I don't do it on purpose_!" Harry stated.

"_No, but it sucks that you do it out of instinct, anyway_," she replied. Sirius heard the sound of a chair dragging and then his daughter announced she was leaving. Harry didn't respond and she just started walking out.

Izzy came out the door, fast as a Muggle bullet, and darted towards the kitchen, barely even giving Sirius time to ask her anything. "Where are you going?" he shouted after her.

"To the Burrow," she yelled back without stopping.

He didn't bother going after her, knowing she'd already be gone by the time he reached the kitchen.

"Kreacher!" he called.

The elf materialized out of nowhere and stood opposite him evenly. "Yes, Master."

"Go after her. Make sure she got to the Burrow alright and then come back," he instructed the house-elf. If she wasn't going to stay around to cool down, Sirius needed to know that at least she'd gotten to her destination safely. He'd go check himself if he wasn't sure that interfering that soon after the fight wouldn't do any good.

Kreacher didn't protest at the least and gave him a ghost of an approving nod before disapparating with a 'pop'.

Sirius let out a breath just as soon as the elf left. That _really _was a sticky one. Turned out, he'd been right in the end – the whole situation had been a recipe for disaster and, as expected, it had blown right on their faces. Or rather Harry's mostly.

Mia would have known how to handle it better, he was sure. And it irked it beyond words. How was it possible that he could feel like such an enlightened father in some ways and such a clueless one in others?

Sirius sighed and looked at the baby again – she seemed to be snoozing on his arms, all pink-cheeked and cuddled against him. At least that one seemed to be happy enough, he thought. "Maybe Mommy was right to wonder if I could handle you and those two at the same time," he admitted in annoyance. "Bloody teenagers and their hormones. You're staying that size forever, you hear me?" He kissed the top of the sleeping baby's head as he cradled her closely. "Not an inch bigger, Mary."

**A/N: After a week full of papers and chapter writing, I'm finally done with college for a couple of weeks (Thank god!). I thought it would never end. Anyway, things got a bit sticky between Harry and Izzy this time around - I was planning this for a while, thus the lack of Izzy for a while... You'll have the follow-up next chapter, don't worry. Feedback is welcome, as always - Review!**


	36. Fifth Wheel

**A/N: Well, here is your _late _christmas chapter... in my defense, we had like 20 people over for Christmas this year, so the holidays were madness. Relatives came over all the way from Britain, including a cousin (first cousin two or three times removed, I think, old as ancient skies) just as nice as the Weasleys' Great-Aunt Muriel. Let's just say she spent the whole time bossing people around and calling me and my sister Naomi by the name 'Catherine' - I'm convinced she thought we were the same person, only with an uncanny ability to split into two bodies with very different lenghts of hair... Anyway, after this whole... odissey, here's your chapter, mostly featuring Izzy for a change this time...**

If she hadn't been so worked up when she flooed into the Burrow, Izzy might have felt a bit rude about showing up there early and without a warning. In her defence, Molly Weasley frequently pointed out that the doors of her house were always open for her, the idiot whose name she didn't even want to think of at the moment but which started with an H and ended with a Y or any other member of the Black Family – barring the estranges Voldemort-friendly side of the family, of course.

The floo connection led her straight to the Weasley kitchen, a sort of permanent tidy mess of pots, pans and plates, which was strangely empty at the moment. Usually, there was always someone present in it: either Mrs. Weasley messing with her cooking, Mr. Weasley reading the newspaper or one of their children trying to sneak themselves a snack between meals. Neither seemed to be the case at the moment and for a moment she wondered if there was anyone at home at all…

Izzy was about to announce her presence, hoping someone would hear her, when she heard a cracking sound behind her that made her turn around in a flash, her hand reaching for her wand already.

"Kreacher!" she said, a bit too sharply when her eyes landed on the elderly house-elf. "What on Earth are you doing here?"

The house-elf flinched slightly over having been caught. "Master send Kreacher to see if young Mistress arrive alright," he said in a little voice. "Master worried because young mistress look upset."

Izzy sighed – it made her feel slightly bad she'd just stormed out on her dad when none of what had happened had been his fault. He'd actually been urging Harry to tell her about his plans… "Well, then tell him that I've arrived alright, okay? And that he really doesn't have to worry because I'm fine," she told the house-elf in a less snippy tone of voice, which was quite an effort to manage, feeling as pissed off as she did at the moment.

"And Master Harry…?" Kreacher asked tentatively.

Izzy narrowed her eyes that time and nearly growled. "Feel free to quote me calling him a stupid, insensitive dolt. And I don't mean that in a cute let's-make-amends sort of way. Be sure to underline that if you come around to tell him," she said, thinking she'd want her 'brother' to simmer for a while.

Kreacher nodded, a bit hesitantly, and disappeared in the same way as he'd appeared. Just as he vanished, quick steps came down the stairs of the house and, seconds later, Ginny appeared at the bottom.

"Oh, I thought I heard voices down here," her best friend observed, surprised to see her. "I didn't think you'd show up until later."

Izzy nodded. "Yeah, me coming now was a bit unplanned. I just needed to get out of home."

"Something wrong?" Ginny inquired, raising an eyebrow as she sensed a tone of annoyance in her friends' voice.

Izzy simply grunted moodily in return. She figured that probably made her sound a bit childish but, what the hell, she had a right to act childish at the moment…

"I take it that means 'I don't want to talk about it' in some sort of caveman language," Ginny comically observed. "Listen, we're all upstairs. Mom's making us try on the stuff we're supposed to wear for the wedding. She sent me down to fetch some pins – like she can't conjure more if needs them. She just doesn't want me to see the horrid alterations she's doing to my dress… I'd invite you upstairs but honestly I think it's better for your mental health if you just stay down here. They've gone mental: Mom and Fleur are all over the place with those blasted wedding plans…"

"Your mom and Fleur get along well now?" Izzy asked in surprise. The last she recalled of the Weasleys' matriarch's interaction with her future daughter in law involved a deep cold politeness from both sides and a desperation for the other one to disappear.

"Get along well? Ever since the battle at Hogwarts, they've been joined at the hip in what comes to this wedding. As far as Mom's concerned, Fleur fighting alongside with Bill and the whole Order proved her worth. I suppose she's not that bad, after all, but, honestly, they're acting completely ment…"

"_Ginny, what's taking you so long? Come back up here! We're waiting for you,_" Molly Weasley's voice came from the upper floors.

Ginny groaned and approached the stairs in order to respond. "Izzy's down here, Mom!" she shouted back. "Maybe I should stay to keep her some company."

Molly Weasley's response came in the form of steps down the stairs headed to them, only ending when the older redhead's form became visible to them.

"Oh, Izzy, dear, how lovely to see you," she greeted her with a warm smile, stopping midway through the staircase.

"You too, Mrs. Weasley. Sorry for showing up so early…"

The older woman gestured dismissively with her hand before Izzy could finish. "No nonsense, dear. You're always welcome here at any time of the day. Why don't you join us upstairs? We're trying on our robes for Bill's wedding."

"Er…" Izzy started, watching as Ginny shook her head and dramatically mouthed to her something that seemed to mean 'save yourself'. "I think I'll just stay down here – wouldn't want to get in your way upstairs. You must be busy."

"Crumbling under all the work to be done," Ginny said, agreeing with her friend before she looked up the stairs to face her mother. "And I suppose I should stay down here too in order to keep Izzy company like a good hostess should. The dress fitting will just have to wait…"

"Nice try, young lady," Molly said, her eyes narrowed knowingly. "You get yourself into the twins' old room – Fleur is waiting up there with your bridesmaid dress."

"Mom!" Ginny groaned.

"And stop whining about it, Ginevra Molly Weasley!" the older woman demanded just as the kitchen's door opened behind Izzy. Before she even could turn around to see who it was, internally preparing herself to hurl something at the person's face if it was Harry, Molly announced it out loud. "Oh, George, dear. Yours and Fred's robes aren't ready for fitting just yet but I need you to play host with Izzy while Ginny tries on hers."

The redheaded prankster groaned immediately and Izzy felt a bit bummed that he was that annoyed about playing host for her or whatever. It didn't take her that long to realize that wasn't the reason why he'd groaned. "Fred, Mom! I'm Fred, not George. Merlin, just how many times…"

"Oh, stop being lame," Ginny told him impatiently. "You're just as much Fred as I am, George!"

Her brother raised his eyebrows and didn't see it worth bothering to keep the act up. "Well, technically, since we're identical twins…"

"For Merlin's sake!" Molly shouted, turning to her son. "I don't have time to sort this out. Whoever you are, Fred or George, play host for a while, will you?" She didn't wait for her son to answer before making her way up the stairs, humming something about having raised a herd of savages under her breath. "_Ginny!"_

"I'm coming!" the youngest redhead responded in annoyance.

"How can you tell them apart so easily?" Izzy wondered out loud before her friend could leave as well. "Fred and George, I mean."

Ginny shrugged as she approached the stairs. "Freckles. Fred has more of them on the left side of his face, George on the right side. Easy to spot when you're looking for it."

"Oi!" George complained, covering the right half of his face instinctively. "Stop with the secret-revealing, will you, woman? You're ruining our game! Do us a favour and go upstairs play dress up with Mom and Fleur like the pretty little doll you are, Gin-Gin."

His sister glared murderously and nearly barked at him – calling her a _'pretty little doll' _was far from a good idea… "I _hate_ you. And dress fittings. I hate dress fittings!" She huffed loudly in annoyance and stalked up the stairs with heavy steps in a full blown temper tantrum.

George snorted when he heard the door upstairs closing with a bang and his mother yelling at Ginny afterwards. "Looks like someone's channelling her six-year-old self. Let's hope it passes soon."

Izzy looked at him in confusion, sitting down at the kitchen table as George did the same. "Why do you say that?"

"Clearly you didn't know her at that age or you wouldn't be asking me that. Let's say that there was no doubt who ruled this house by then and, as much as I hate to admit it, it wasn't Fred and I. Never underestimate a cute red-headed little girl. She had a temper the size of a continent and more dirt on any of us than you can possibly imagine. And if you pushed her too far, you can bet she'd… well, let's say she'd go on a truth bender. Feed Mom some of that dirt and let her wrath loose on us – it wasn't pretty. Little-kid Ginny was kinda scary, now that I think of it… It's a good things she was born in our family, 'cause if she'd been a Malfoy or a Lestrange… well, she might have turned up into one hell of a dark lady."

This time, Izzy rolled her eyes. "Merlin, you are not exaggerating even a little, are you, George?" she asked sarcastically. "You make her sound like a psychopath, which I know for a fact she isn't."

The redhead shrugged. "Believe what you want to. The point is that you wouldn't want to mess with Ginny's six-year old self. What did_ you_ do at six years old?"

Izzy shrugged. "I held tea parties with my stuffed toys and dragged Harry into them too. I made him wear one of Lulu's beach sun floppy hats on his head 'cause I thought that constant mess his hair is in would offend the rest of the guests. One way or the other, he always ended up with the bloody hat on his had," Izzy recalled with a chuckle. The amusement lasted for just a few seconds after mentioning Harry since she remembered the exact reason why she'd come to the Burrow and why there was a heavy weight of frustration and hurt in her throat. Back then she was always the first one to know everything, not the last…

"Merlin, eager infliction of torture on a brother… even then you and Ginny would have been the bestest of friends," George commented before noticing her sudden change of mood. "What's with the sudden long face?"

She shrugged. "Nothing."

"Well, 'nothing' put quite a frown on you," he observed. "If you're not careful, that's gonna give you some wrinkles that not even our bloody expensive _Wonder-Witch_ products can make go away. We wouldn't want you to look like a hag before you turn seventy at least. Sharing would come a lot cheaper and might be even more successful with the hypothetical wrinkles than cosmetic potions."

Izzy tried to ignore him. "I just don't want to talk about it."

George rolled his eyes. "Fine, then don't talk about it. Go on sulking – that's just brilliant for your health – gives your skin a majestic glow…"

"Shut up, George," she mumbled, trying not to feel amused.

"Come on, I'm curious! And I don't deal well with curiosity – you're gonna make me beg?"

She shrugged. "Sure. Beg away." Izzy looked away and tried to seem uninterested but, even without seeing it, she knew he was still observing her. Knowing that made her feel a bit jumpy, actually… Not in a particularly bad way. It just put a strange feeling in her stomach… like flutters or something… "Don't you have anything else to do, anyway?" she asked at some point. "Like running a successful joke shop? Plotting practical jokes with Fred? Where is he now, anyway?"

"First of all, I happen to be here 'cause Mom demanded we tried our robes on today too. Plus, Remus can handle the shop on his own when needed – he's that efficient. As for Fred, he's busy at the moment. Showing the shed to Angelina," George pointed out easily.

Izzy looked at him oddly. "Showing the shed…"

"Maybe not in one of the most literal ways to do so…" he stated, casually hinting that other activities were taking place in the Weasley shed.

She rolled her eyes. "Your mom would have his head if she found out about that, you know? Did he honestly just bring Angelina over for the fitting in order to… give her a tour through the shed?"

"Oh, no. Angie's got to try her dress too. She's going to be a bridesmaid for Fleur," George declared.

"A bridesmaid?" Izzy asked in surprise – she didn't recall hearing of Angelina Johnson and Fleur Delacour actually sharing more than a few polite greetings over the Weasley dinners. They barely had anything in common.

"Yeah, we were surprised too. But apparently they bonded over dating a Weasley bloke at the same time – according to them, it's quite a hardship…"

Izzy had to chuckle. "I'll have to take their word for it – knowing you people, it's likely accurate…"

"Hey!" George complained. "I'll have you know Weasleys are perfectly regular dating material – nothing tricky about us. Not that you care, anyway, since I have a feeling you're just pushing this conversation further in order to avoid that one we were having two minutes ago – something about you not wanting to share what's upsetting you… If you want me to piss off, just say so – but first I'm going to take a blind shot and guess this whole thing is about guy-troubles. Need Fred and I to rough up some bloke a little?"

Izzy hesitated before responding – she _could _tell him to piss off as he'd pointed out. But still, she supposed it was easy talking to George since he had this strange way of putting her at ease with his easygoing ways (except when he was just staring at her, which gave her those weird sensations).

Honestly, she needed to vent about her spat with Harry – she'd thought of doing so with Ginny at first but then that would put her friend in an awkward position right in the middle of a conflict between her best friend and her boyfriend. She couldn't expect Ginny to take sides or to be an impartial judge in _that_… Maybe George wouldn't be such a bad person to talk to in that case, after all. Provided he acted serious about it, which she supposed he could manage to do from time to time.

"It's something about a guy alright. Just not quite the sort you're imagining," she shared in a slightly detached tone, avoiding looking at him.

"Hum, I take it you mean there's no dim-witted boyfriend for me and Fred to torture, then," George concluded, feeling slightly hopeful she'd confirm it. Hopeful in a protective way, he justified to himself. Yes – she was as good as family and her father was a fellow prankster. It was a matter of loyalty feeling protective about her…

Oblivious to his thoughts, Izzy shook her head as her eyes remained on the landscape out the kitchen's window. "Not really."

"What's it about, then?" It was about a guy but not a about a boyfriend and likely no suitor to that position too or she would have mentioned it. Well, that did narrow the list down and made it easier for him to guess. "Did you have a fight with your dad? Or maybe Harry?" She finally turned to him and shot arrows with her eyes at the mention of her adoptive brother's name, leading him to conclude he's found the source of her annoyance. "Well, there it is. What did my may-at-some-point-brother-in-law-to-be do to get on your bad side?"

"He's a git," she said moodily.

The redhead chuckled at her words. "Well, that's sort of common knowledge, Isabelle. Would you be a bit more specific?"

She groaned and, just as she was about to specify, something occurred to her. George didn't know about the Horcruxes – as far as she knew, no one from the Weasley family aside from Ron and Ginny knew about them. Telling him about the Horcrux hunt without explaining about the Horcruxes in the first place wouldn't make any sense… She instantly regretted not having just told him to piss off like he'd said before and avoiding reaching that point of the conversation. It seemed like an awful thing to think but it would be just as awful to leave him hanging… "It's complicated, George. It's stupid but I can't be _much_ more specific than this – I promised… well, no, that's not true. I didn't promise anything. But still this thing… the reason why I'm angry at… at _him_ is about something that's not really mine to tell you. I'm sorry – I shouldn't have started this conversation in the first place…" She motioned to get up in order to leave but George grabbed hold of her arm before she could.

"Hey, hey!" he protested. "Where do you think you're going?"

"George…"

"First of all, I'm the one who started this conversation," he pointed out, "so don't apologize about that. Second of all, no one is asking you to share someone else's secrets or anything more than you can." He was curious about the parts she couldn't share – he couldn't deny that – but not nearly enough to bully a friend into telling him something she wasn't comfortable about.

Besides, it wasn't like he didn't know Harry had his own cut of secrets and plans that he wouldn't share with anyone but his closest friends – and, bearing in mind the amount of crap Harry had to deal with in a regular basis, George couldn't bring himself to take it personally. At the end of the day, his sister's boyfriend was still more of a hero than anyone else he knew.

"Look," he started, "just say what you can and I'm sure I can use my imagination to fill in the blanks you leave. Even if we know odds are my imagination will turn the whole thing into a comedy in my mind…" He managed a grin when he said that last part and noticed Izzy biting her lower lip as the corners of her mouth turned slightly upwards.

His words really made her want to not walk away and she wondered if she could manage continuing that conversation without actually spilling Harry's secrets – she might be angry at her brother in a way because of those same secrets but she understood what was and what wasn't hers to share… "Are you sure you're okay with that? Because it sounds to me like you're in the weakest end of this deal, George."

He shrugged. "Well, I suppose if I have to be in the weakest end of a deal, I might as well do it when the deal in question is between me and a good friend. Just do me a favour and promise that at some point you'll fill the blanks for me. Preferably before I go mad wondering."

She felt unsure about that at first. But then she concluded that no secret lasted forever – or at least she hoped so. And she hoped that one, the Horcruxes, Voldemort's near-immortality, wouldn't have to last very long – hopefully ending with his destruction. She supposed after it was all over there would be no problem in telling George about it. "It's a deal."

"Deal," he repeated. "Now, will you _please_ just tell me what this is about?"

Izzy sighed. "It really is complicated."

"Then un-complicate it," the redhead said easily.

She sighed. "It's like…" She paused and licked her own lips, looking up at George. "Well, I'm always the last one to know everything important when it comes to Harry."

George furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?"

"I mean…" she huffed. "I don't know how to explain it without going into specifics, George."

"Come on, you're a smart girl. Give it a try."

She did so, pausing for several seconds as she thought of the words and the sentences. "I suspected Harry was up to something for the past few days but I figured it wouldn't be that important or he'd let me into the secret. Turns out it was _really _important – and how do I know that, you may ask. Well, because he only just told me about it today – after telling Ron, Hermione, Ginny… even my parents. All of them days ago!"

"And you were the last one to know," George guessed easily.

She nodded. "It's not the first time it happens – not the first time I end up being the last one to find out about something so important. I know loads of people don't know about this at all, you included, but it's not the same. It probably sounds selfish and… frivolous but…"

"…it isn't," he finished for her, understanding what she meant. "You grew up together – it's understandable that him constantly leaving you for last these days hurts you. Odds are I'd feel pretty bummed too if Fred did that to me." Although, he had to admit he and Fred were a different situation – twin-hood made then closer than regular siblings, blood-related or not.

Izzy nodded slowly. "It does. Even more so because we didn't _just_ grow up together." She sighed. "We used to be each other's best friends. We never went to school before we came to Hogwarts since Lulu was around to home-school us – I suppose because of that, we never really made friends outside of home. But it was okay – we were enough for each other. Most boys don't really care about having their little sisters following them around everywhere, as you probably know yourself."

George shrugged. "At that age, we pretty much see all girls, especially younger ones, as annoying little brats. Don't take it personally."

"Well, maybe it was because I was the only kid around for him to play with but Harry was okay with it," Izzy told him. "We did everything together and there were no secrets between us then – I was the first to know when Harry was up to something and he the other way around… well, unless it was about one of us planning a practical joke on the other. Anyway, then we came to Britain and Harry went to Hogwarts, where he met Ron and Hermione. I wasn't jealous…" she paused, reconsidering. "Well, maybe I was. Just a little… but I met Ginny and got myself a new friend too. We weren't each other's only friends anymore. And time kept passing, so things changed. Now everything is different: there's Harry, Ginny, Ron and Hermione… and then there's me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not accusing them of being bad friends. Ginny, especially… she's the greatest best friend you can have. But still when it comes to the important stuff, the secrets…"

"… you feel left out of the group," George concluded. "Legitimately, let me add. Now there's Harry and Ginny, the happily co-dependent couple, and Ron and Hermione, a pair themselves in their own twisted let's-bicker-until-we-end-up-snogging-one-of-these-days way – the four of them form a sort of private group and you're outside of it. You became the fifth-wheel. And nobody wants to be the spare wheel…"

"How did it get to this?" Izzy asked in a sad whisper. "How did I get from being the first one to know everything to the last?" She shook her head and looked away. "Sometimes I wonder, you know? If I'm too youngto be their friend in the first place… I should be one year behind Ginny, you know? Having been born in December and all. It didn't matter before but…"

"Oh, well, it must be just that, then. You're simply like a little kid compared to them. And to me…" he clicked his tongue, shaking his head. That 'too young' mention annoyed him more than he'd expected. "I guess I should switch to cooing and baby talk when it comes to you, then, since you're simply too young to understand actual speech. Are you even eating solids, yet?"

She glared. "Don't be a jerk. You don't have to be so sarcastic about this."

"Yeah, well, you don't have to be so brainless about this!" he snapped back before he could get a hold of himself. He regretted saying that immediately, as he saw her glare deepening and caught her glancing towards the door like she was planning to escape. He took a deep breath and spoke more calmly afterwards. "You're not _brainless_, so don't act like you are. There's no age standard for friendship, Izzy. And even though they have their own little group, you can't question that they're all still your friends – you said so yourself. Likely, they don't even realize you're being left out – sucks just the same, I know, but trust me on this one. I know how it feels like to be the spare wheel…"

Izzy looked at him doubtfully, still a bit annoyed. "You do?"

"Sure. With Fred and Angelina. It took me a while to get used to them – my twin brother and best mate turning all lovey dovey all the time with another one of my best friends. Spending half his time snogging her all over the place… I was happy for them and everything but I felt a bit like a third wheel for a while too."

She was silent for several seconds. "How did you work around that?"

He shrugged. "We just talked about it and reached an agreement to end the awkwardness. Eventually I got used to him and Angie being a thing – I give them their space, they give me mine and when the three of us are hanging out, they're not Fred and Angie, the couple, making me the third wheel. Instead we're Fred, George and Angelina good old friends, former class and teammates. Of course, in your case, it's not just a about a couple with a PDA problem… yet the solution is the same. You've got to talk to Harry. Yell if you want to – you've got a right to it, all things considered."

"Yeah, well, I think I've already used up my right to yell before I came here…" she mumbled. "It got pretty loud, I imagine."

George raised his eyebrows. "What did Harry say then?"

She shrugged. "I guess he was surprised I felt this way. Said he hadn't meant to leave me for last, which honestly just makes it worse because it keeps happening anyway…" she informed the redhead, sighing. "Apparently, he just waited to tell me after he told my parents so I wouldn't be in a _difficult_ _position_ by having to keep it from them. Who does that? He should know I wouldn't have hesitated in keeping any secret he asked me to keep."

He took a deep breath. "Listen, sometimes us guys, especially when we're Harry's age and have as much stuff to worry about as he does, can be a bit thick about other people's feelings. I'd bet my arm and leg that the last thing he meant to do when he didn't immediately share whatever is going on with you was hurting you. In his own way, it's pretty clear he was trying to spare you a little and, yeah, maybe thinking of you more as a little sister than as an old friend when he did that. But that doesn't mean that's all you are now. You two just _really _need to talk…"

Izzy was about to say something in return but wasn't able to even start it when the door leading to the garden opened and Fred stepped in with Angelina, a grin all over his face.

"Hello, Izzy," he greeted her. "Spiffy seeing you here."

"Hi, Fred. Angelina," Izzy greeted the other two before Fred turned to his twin.

"Mom hasn't summoned us yet?" he asked.

George shook his head. "Not so far. Must be sticking pins all over Ginny – you know how much our lovely sister loves dress fittings… How was the shed?"

Fred grinned. "Good. Took me a while to show it to Angie, thought – I had to put a lot of emphasis in demonstrating how sturdy the walls were…"

The former Quidditch captain (and current backup chaser for the Caerphilly Catapults, a Welsh Quidditch team from the minor leagues) elbowed him on the ribs unceremoniously. "Don't be crass, Fred! Isabelle doesn't have to put up with your perverted mind," she said, turning to Izzy. "Can you believe these guys?"

"Not if I didn't actually know them personally," Izzy replied with a soft chuckle. Her mood seemed to have improved severely after talking to George, like a weight had been lifted from her chest.

"Yeah, yeah, that's what they all say…" George mumbled just as the sound of steps came down the stairs and Ginny appeared behind him, looking pretty annoyed.

"If I have to try on that thing one more time…" she murmured through her teeth.

"That pleasant, was it?" Fred asked her, grinning cheekily.

She glared at her brothers. "Mom's waiting for you two in your old room – looks like the wedding fairy barfed all over it, by the way. Ron's already over there, anyway, trying his robes on too." She turned to Angelina, then. "Fleur has your bridesmaid dress in Bill's room."

"Hey, how come we're all stuck with Mom and Angelina gets to be all alone with Fleur?" Fred protested before realizing how he might have sounded and turning to his annoyed girlfriend. "Not that I have any reason to want to be half-naked in front of her… Did I mention I see her purely as a sister? No lusty feelings whatsoever involved…"

Angelina rolled her eyes. "Remind me why I agreed to date you in the first place…"

"'Cause I'm rich and good-looking?" Fred tried. "Plus, I'm pretty sure you get a kick out of dating a younger bloke, even if it's just by six or so months…"

She shook her head. "You're an idiot," she said, huffing and making her way up the stairs as Fred followed her, trying to convince her otherwise.

"Well," George said, getting up from his seat again. "I suppose I'd better go after them before Angelina gets physical with him – and not in a good way…"

Izzy got up too and stood up, awkwardly looking at George for a couple of seconds before saying anything. It had felt easier talking to him earlier when they'd been alone – now, she was pretty aware of Ginny's presence as she stood against the counter, taking a bite of an apple as she looked oddly between the two.

"So, thanks," Izzy said. "For the talk and the advice. I'll talk to him later when he comes over for dinner."

George nodded. "You don't have to thank me about that. And try to give him a chance to speak when you get to that. Before yelling some more, I mean. He might have something interesting to say, which may spare your vocal chords a little…"

She chuckled. "I'll try to do tha…"

"_George, what's taking you so long?" _they heard Molly yelling. "_Hurry up. I can't do this all day – I need to start dinner soon!"_

"I'm going, Mom!" he shouted back before turning back to Izzy and Ginny. "Duty calls."

He disappeared up the stairs a few seconds later and Izzy turned to face her best friend, who was still looking at her quite oddly. "What? Do I have something on my face?" she asked self-consciously.

"No," Ginny responded, taking another bite of her apple as she kept looking at Izzy. "Is there something going on between you two?"

"Between who?"

The look on the redhead's face all but called her 'dumb'. "You and George, who else?"

"Oh," she mumbled. "No. Why? Did it look like there was?"

Ginny shrugged. "Maybe. Then again I've just been released from wedding-land. I suppose one of the second-effects of being there is seeing romance everywhere." Hearing that, Izzy looked away, trying to hide a blush. Romance – that was a strong word… "

"Anyway, what did Harry do to you?" the redhead asked.

Izzy furrowed her brows and turned to her again. "Why do you think he's done anything to me at all?"

"Well, first of all, you were in a pretty snippy mood when you arrived, which would mean you were upset about something," her best friend started. "Then, you said you said you'd come here because you needed to get out of home and just now you mentioned to George you'd talk to some bloke – which might involve yelling of some sort – when he came over for dinner. All that together leads me to believe that either your Dad or Harry… or, well, Alex, who are the only three male presences at your home as far as I know, did something to upset. Since I doubt your two-year-old brother did something to piss you off and your dad is completely wrapped around your little finger most of the time, that leaves Harry as the culprit. Am I on the right path?"

For a moment, she just gaped at her friend. Nothing escaped her, did it? "Yep – he's the culprit," she ended up confirming.

"Well, so this thing Harry was what you were upset about before? You seemed pretty pissed off."

Izzy nodded. "I was. Still am, though not half as much. I'm mostly frustrated. But George helped me figure out most of it while you were upstairs doing your dress fitting. He's pretty easy to talk to on occasion."

"Yeah, the twins have their moments from time to time when they're not blowing up stuff," Ginny confirmed with a chuckle before sighing. "So, tell me honestly, which of your arses am I supposed to kick today? Yours or Harry's?"

Half an hour before, Izzy would have responded Harry's for sure. She'd have told Ginny to kick him hard and then not speak to him for a week just to drive him crackers. But at the moment, after hearing George's reasoning, she wasn't quite sure.

She couldn't turn back time and make herself and Harry each other's best and only friends again. Honestly, she probably wouldn't if she was given the chance, considering how she wouldn't be able to bring herself to give up her current other friends: Ginny, Hermione, Ron, Luna, Neville… George and the other Weasleys… They were all important to her.

Yet, of one thing, she was sure: she didn't want to be left out anymore. To be the last one to know.

After all, George had been right to say that no one wanted to be the spare wheel and that was what she was at the moment…

**A/N 2: Well, not much more to say. Happy New Year in advance, I guess! This will continue next chapter. Feedback is always welcome, as always! Review!**


	37. Apologies

**A/N: Sorry for the delay - I had quite a tough couple of weeks with family issues, a not so satisfying grade at an oral presentation and a few problems in another site where I post that led me to having to edit about 10 chapters... Anyway, today you get an extra big chapter (sort of two in one) for your patience. It's a bit slow paced but, well, it's the best I could come up with. Enjoy!**

Although Mia frankly hated to admit that fact, Sirius had been completely right. Going out with Elizabeth had helped dissolving the huge amount of stress she'd been sinking under lately. By a lot.

She wasn't sure how her best friend had pulled it off but, at some point, she had found herself in a much better mood. Certainly, it couldn't have been much about the shopping part, which had mostly consisted of her sitting on a sofa while Elizabeth tried dozens (many, many dozens) of outfits, only to actually buy a couple of them… followed by a shockingly large amount of shoes. In a way, it seemed a bit frivolous to join her friend in a (one-sided) shopping spree in times like the current but it had been just what she needed – a little Mia and friends time without thinking of her worries or problems. A break from all that stress almost without thinking of war and imminent tragedy surrounding her godson's fate.

How they'd managed to fit all of Elizabeth's shopping into less than two hours (and a single pay check) was a mystery to Mia but her friend had undoubtedly been able to pull it off just in time to drag her into a café in Muggle London and smother her sorrows under several slices of cake. She hadn't spoken of what was bothering her and Elizabeth hadn't asked her to – Sirius has filled in the healer enough and she understood that, at the moment, the last thing Mia needed was for her to bring the matter up, which couldn't have been more right… One afternoon escaping from stress and problems seemed to work miracles.

"Well, don't Sirius and I work well when we gang up on you?" Elizabeth asked triumphantly as they walked through the streets of Muggle London on their way back to the leaky cauldron. "Although, since I was the one dragging you around all afternoon I have to say, I should get most of the credit for it."

"I'm sure he'll have something to say about that," Mia pointed out.

The blonde chuckled. "Sure he will: '_Thank you, Elizabeth, for fixing my stressed out wife. I'm your eternal faithful servant_,'" she said. "You know, if he hadn't asked me to take you out in such a short notice, I would have taken you to this place at Bath where they have really great massages. I went there a few months ago with Kingsley and it was so relaxing I nearly lapsed into a coma."

Mia rolled her eyes. "I'd rather keep comas out of the equation, thank you very much," she pointed out dryly, before turning to her best friend with a much more serious look on her face. "But thank you, Elizabeth, I feel much better now."

"Well, you'd better, wouldn't you?" Elizabeth told her. "Just don't let it happen again – getting this stressed out, I mean."

She sighed. "Sometimes it's a bit hard to help it."

Her friend gave her a sympathetic smile. "I know, Mia. Merlin, I can only image how I would deal with… anything if Harper was in Harry's situation. But you can't jet let this… stress take you over, no matter how hard it is. Give yourself some Mia time every once in a while or you'll go mad – this is my advice as a friend _and _a healer's. And you know I'm always a floo call away if you need to vent about anything."

She sighed. "I know, Elizabeth. I do. You're a good friend."

Trying to cheer her up, Elizabeth frowned. "_Good_? Why, Mia, no. What I am is a _great_ friend…"

Mia has to chuckle at that. "You know, sometimes I wonder how Sirius never got to you in his let's-date-every-girl-at-Hogwarts phase – you two can be so unbelievably smug sometimes."

The blonde shrugged.. "Likely because we'd strangle each other by the end of the first week together." Even though she couldn't that Sirius had always been attractive, even in her standards, she'd never felt an actual attraction for him. Maybe it was because, from an early time, she'd been aware of Mia's own attraction for him or maybe for any other completely different reason. It just hadn't been there with Sirius. "I like my match better than him."

"You know, I'm still getting used to you and Kingsley being together," Mia admitted.

Elizabeth smiled. "I've got to admit part of me feels that way too. " She absently rubbed the finger where her engagement ring was supposed to be. To keep appearances and the secret safe, it was at home, tucked in her jewellery container – she couldn't wait for the moment when she'd be able to wear it freely. But that couldn't happen until the war was over. Hopefully it would happen soon… her children needed a father that wasn't on the run from the goblins from his immense gambling debts.

"I actually had no idea you liked him. _That_ way, I mean," Mia admitted. "It's frustrating – you were sure I was in love with Sirius before I even admitted it to myself."

"Well, I did secretly harbour a little crush for Kingsley back in our Hogwarts days but it was just a crush – why else did you think I joined the gobstones club back then than because of its quite attractive captain?"

Mia laughed. "Lily and I did wonder what you were doing there at all. You never quite seemed like the type to like playing gobstones."

"It's all about where the boys are," Elizabeth told her cheekily. "But then Ludo came all charming and athletic… I know you and Lily didn't like him, by the way."

"You… oh, well, it's true," Mia admitted. "I'm sorry he was just so… dumb sometimes. All he talked about when he was with us was Quidditch. It just… he didn't seem like the right fitting for you."

Elizabeth laughed. "Which proved itself to be true. And, yeah, Ludo could be dim-witted that way, I suppose…" She smiled, then. "He did manage to produce two non dim-witted children, who I wouldn't give up for anything in this world, though," she said as they arrived at the Leaky Cauldron and stepped in. There, Elizabeth checked her watch and turned to Mia. "Well, it's five thirty. What do you say? Do you want to stick around another hour to push Sirius's buttons by going back home late? I believe he'd established your curfew at six…"

"Maybe next time," Mia told her, a little amused. "I actually am not planning to go straight back home. Alex spent the afternoon at a playmate's place – Darcy Finnigan. I suppose that, since I'm outside of home already, I might as well pick him up."

"Oh, well, I can always hope he'll throw a tantrum and you'll get home late anyway," Elizabeth joked as they approached the fireplace.

Mia rolled her eyes. "You get too much of a kick out of irking Sirius."

The blonde grinned. "What can I say? He's the annoying cousin I never had."

Both of them laughed at that admission and parted ways shortly after, with Elizabeth flooing home from the pub, reminding her friend not to be a stranger.

Mia herself made it back home less than half an hour later, after having dropped by the house that had once been hers at Wales – now occupied by the O'Dells, Darcy and Seamus Finnigan's grandparents and guardians after the death of their parents the past autumn – in order to pick up Alex.

The little boy seemed to have had quite a good time there with his young friend Darcy and, just as soon as he'd landed eyes on his mother (and promptly nearly knocker her to the floor, so tightly he's wrapped himself around her legs) had gone on and on, in his own simple two-year-old dialect, about what he'd done that afternoon, apparently spent at the pond near the house.

The floo journey back home seemed to be the only thing that managed to calm his excitement as, by the time they got home and Mia stepped out of the fireplace, he was very silent, clinging tightly to her neck and his stuffed dog, his little face buried against the crook of her neck. Floo seemed to have a slightly… petrifying effect on him. Alex had never been a big fan of any means of Wizarding transport, either it was floo travelling, apparition or portkeys – in a way, it seemed a bit odd since he'd been side-along apparating and floo travelling practically since he'd been born. But then again, Mia herself didn't find them all that pleasant either despite her decades of experience in those. She supposed their lack of comfort was a small price to pay for commodity of travelling across the country in a matter of seconds.

Softly, Mia rubbed her son's back and kissed the top of his head after dusting a small amount of ash from his dark hair as well as his stuffed toy. "There, honey, the trip's over. We're home," she told him in a soothing tone.

The little boy seemed a bit hesitant as he tentatively pulled his face away from her the safe warmness of his mother's neck and looked around in order to confirm if they were really home. Like a light had been switched on, he smiled as soon as he saw they were indeed in the house's familiar kitchen and immediately pointed at his beloved cookie jar. "Wanna cookie, Mama."

Mia laughed at him softly. "Little boys only get cookies after dinner," she replied, kissing the tip of his little nose and placing him down on the floor.

Before Alex had any chance to complain, the sound of steps came from the staircase leading to the ground floor, which clearly stole all the attention his two-year-old self could provide – soon, the curious little boy was running towards the kitchen door as fast as his short legs would allow him, pulling his stuffed dog behind him by the tail, more interested in finding out who was coming down then in getting himself a cookie snack.

Mia head a delighted squeal from her son, followed by her husband's surprised tone. "_And how did you get here on your own, little monster?"_ she heard him asking the little boy, to her amusement.

Her son's giggling followed. "_No, Daddy! No… twickewing_!" the little boy said between laughs right before Sirius stepped into the kitchen, holding him on his hip as he poked his ticklish ribs.

Sirius's eyes landed on her a fraction of a second after he entered the room and his eyebrows, previously raised in confusion at his son's presence, returned to their usual place. "Oh, you're back. Thank Merlin – I was starting to wonder if this one had learnt how to use the floo on his own." He shivered at the very thought – considering how much of a hell-raiser that kid was at times, that would definitely be a problem. "I was just about to go pick him up myself."

"I was already outside of home – I figured I might as well pick him up and bring him home," Mia quickly explained, lazily taking a few steps closer to Sirius but not reaching him yet. "As for Alex learning how to use using the floo on his own – let's hope that doesn't happen anytime soon. He's not even two and a half years old yet – I'd say he's not quite _that_ advanced."

Sirius gave her a dubious look. "You never know. With parents as smart as us, he may be a genius for all we know. Isn't that right mate?" he asked his son.

"No, Daddy," Alex said, giggling, even though he didn't exactly get what his father meant. He really just felt like saying 'no'. Daddy usually made funny faces when he said 'no'.

As per his son's expectations, Sirius mock-glared at him. "Hey, mate, you're supposed to agree with me! Us blokes have to stick together against the ladies!"

"No!"

"Little tyke," his father mumbled, ruffling Alex's hair with one of his hands.

From her spot, Mia saw herself sighing as she watched her husband and her little boy's interaction. They looked awfully adorable like that… and awfully alike too, sharing the same silky black hair and dazing grey eyes. It made her smile just a little.

Sirius didn't miss it when he turned his attention from his son back to her and smiled back. "Well, don't you look much more relaxed now, love?" he asked, closing the distance between himself and Mia, touching her lips with his own softly when he reached her. "Looks like the attentive, loving husband in the room was right about you needing to spend some time with Elizabeth."

She slapped his shoulder softly. "Yeah, well, don't get too cocky about it. I had to sit through hours of torture, watching as she spent a small fortune in various shops. She reclaims all credit for cheering me up, by the way."

"Phew, let her. As long as I get to be the one snogging you at the end of the day," he said in a lax tone, chuckling before kissing her once more. That time, he made it last longer than before, just up until Alex started making 'yuck' sounds and complaining to get his parents' attention. Sirius pulled away, then, and Mia reached to caress the little boy's cheek, which seemed to be enough to please him – he didn't even notice it when he dropped his stuffed dog on the floor.

"Whatever she did, I'm glad it worked," he declared as he circled her waist with his arm and walked her to the kitchen table, sitting on a chair with Alex on his lap. "What about you, mate? Had fun this afternoon?" he asked the little boy.

Alex nodded enthusiastically, clearly over his 'no' mood for the moment. "Funny fun, Daddy!" he replied grinning.

"Tell your Daddy what you did, honey," Mia tole him, sitting by Sirius's side and brushing her son's slightly damp hair away from his eyes with her hands.

"I Fwound a fwog!"

"A frog? Was it ugly and green?" his father inquired in amusement.

Either he was sure of his answer or not, Alex nodded enthusiastically.

"And what did you do with it?"

Alex giggled before answering. "Dashy kish it. Yuck!"

Mia couldn't help laughing. "Really? Did it turn into a prince?" she inquired, recalling a muggle story Lulu had told her once when she was a little girl.

Her son gave her a confused, nearly serious, look, not quite understanding the concept of a frog turning into a prince. Typically, the he confusion inside his little head was forgotten just as he spotted his beloved black stuffed dog again on the floor. "Shwafas!" he said, squirming out of his father's lap and running towards the dog in order to fetch it.

Sirius chuckled and sighed, watching as Alex ran to rescue his favourite toy from the hard, cold kitchen floor. "Well, looks like he had a better afternoon than mine."

Mia turned to him, frowning at his tone. "What happened?" she asked as her son settled at her feet, playing with 'Shwafas, the dog'.

Her husband sighed and leaned against the back of a chair. "Well, apparently dealing with two teenagers can be harder than I expected. I think I mucked it up this time."

"What do you mean you 'mucked it up'?" she inquired in concern. "What exactly did happen, Sirius?"

Sirius straightened himself on the chair and took a deep breath. "Well, after you left with Elizabeth I went to the library to have a word with Harry about… you know, the Horcrux hunt," he carefully said, observing Mia closely trying to see if any sign of stress returning by him bringing up the main cause of it. He was happy to see that that wasn't the case but the occasion didn't allow him to let that feeling last long as he continued the story. "We were talking about it and eventually it came up that he still hadn't told Izzy about intending to leave."

"Oh," Mia mumbled. "That's not good."

"No, it isn't. And it gets worse," he said, still quite disbelieving. "Guess who showed up just as I was telling Harry that he'd better tell Izzy soon."

She didn't need more than half a second to guess as it was so painfully obvious. "She did." Mia shook her head in disbelief. "Why does that _always_ happen?"

"That's what I'd like to know," Sirius mumbled, at least glad she shared his view. "Anyway, it wasn't that Harry wasn't intending to tell her at all – apparently, in the middle of his… I don't know, researching and worrying… plus our… er, intense reaction to him leaving… he just starting putting it off and then… forgot."

Mia looked at him oddly. "_Forgot_"

"Unbelievable, I know," Sirius said, all but guessing her thoughts. "But I'm positive it's true, bearing in mind the worrying that kid has had to go through lately. And, well, since the cat was partially out of the bag already, the moment seemed as good as any for him to tell her."

"I take it she wasn't happy," she guessed.

"Oh, that's an understatement," her husband replied. "It wasn't much about the overhearing part, from what I gathered – mostly, Izzy got angry because she was the last one to know… well, at least out of the people that usually know… Apparently, it's been happening a lot lately. And one argument let to another and then another… long story short, there was a _lot_ of yelling afterwards."

"Dear Merlin and Morgana…" Mia mumbled, imagining the scene.

"Blimey, Mia, it was a _mess_," Sirius told her. "I had no idea what to do, so I just sat there… no, I didn't, actually. What I did was walk away at some point and leave them there to do the yelling on their own. _Who_ does that? I mean I had Mary with me and, well, she was getting upset with the noise but still…" He paused and let out a long, heavy breath. "I figured getting in the middle would only make it worse but, Merlin, I'm sure there was a better way to handle it… I think I really messed up this time."

"No, you didn't," Mia told him honestly. She tried to imagine herself in Sirius's position between two squabbling teenagers, one probably close to worn out by all the responsibility falling on him, other frustrated for her powerlessness in it all… She couldn't come up with a way to handle that that would trump over Sirius's. "Look, everything that's happened lately, every word of what you've been telling me to, well, make this thing with Harry leaving to chase the Horcruxes feel better on me… We both have to know that they're not little kids anymore – and, that being the case, they can handle their own quarrels, Sirius. You're right – getting in the middle of their fight wouldn't do any good. Likely, you'd just end up smashed between the two of them. What's left for us to do now is, well, hopefully helping them figuring out how to make amends. We can't fight their battles." She sighed, inwardly noting the double meaning of her words. It hurt, but it was true. They couldn't fight for their children forever. "Just… have you talked with them afterwards?"

"Well, I had a few words with Harry," Sirius said. "He was a bit stunned, so I don't think that worked very much. I tried to let him… 'unstun' himself before giving it another try."

"And Izzy?"

"Er…" he mumbled. "That's a bit harder since she sort of stormed out to the Burrow after the first. Don't worry, I sent Kreacher after her to make sure she got there safely. I imagine Ginny may be acting as her 'Elizabeth' right now."

Mia sighed. "Oh, well, one thing at a time," she said, more to herself than to Sirius. "Ginny will likely knock some sense into Izzy herself before we get to her," she observed, trying to think positive. At the same time, it wasn't much like Izzy to storm out. That _must _have been some fight. She felt bad for Sirius having had to handle it on his own…

Sirius nodded. "Yes, Ginny would probably like Harry to reach the end of the day in one solid piece," he observed. "I suppose the fact that snogging a bloke covered in bumps and bruises is a bother happens to be a positive point to take into account."

Despite noting Sirius's humour was apparently restored for the most part of it, Mia opted to ignore his words, more worried with trying to set up a plan of action in her mind. First things first and Harry, being the one side of the fight that was still present at the house, was first that time. "Listen, why don't you let me go have a word with Harry myself while you give this one a bath," she suggested to Sirius, nodding at Alex, who was still sitting on the floor with his stuffed dog. "I suppose it's my turn to talk to Harry since I've been sort of… avoiding talking to him lately."

"Yeah, right, you just want me to be the on the wrong end of water splashes, courtesy of Mr. Alex here," Sirius joked, getting up and picking up his son from the floor. "How much do you want for a quiet, no-getting-Daddy-all-soaked bath?"

"Cookie!"

"Don't you dare," Mia warned her husband, poking him on the chest with her index finger, her eyes narrowed. "Don't even think of giving him one of those before Dinner."

Sirius chuckled, waving at her as a way to get her to leave the room. "See you in forty-five minutes, love," he told her in amusement.

She rolled her eyes and got up, making her way to the door and climbing up the stairs as her husband's voice reached her ears. "_Now, about that cookie_…"

She was pretty sure he was just saying that to annoy her but, in any case, figured she ought to give him a warning. "I heard that, Sirius!"

His laughter filled her ears and he appeared at the bottom of the stairwell with a cookie-less Alex a few seconds later, grinning in amusement. "I know."

She glared at him for a moment. "You think you're hilarious, don't you?"

"I _am _hilarious," he pointed out in return, turning to his son. "Aren't I?"

"No, Daddy!"

He narrowed his eyes at the amused little boy. "We've got to work on those 'no' moods, mate."

She bit her lower lip to keep herself from laughing and shook her head before turning around and resuming her 'pursuit' for Harry, leaving her husband and son to discuss their nonsense together.

Harry wasn't very hard to find as Kreacher, who she ran into on her way to the upper floors polishing a pile of silverware in the living room, quickly informed her that her godson had left the library a few hours before to go his own room, where he was alone at the moment.

She quickly thanked the house-elf, who was happy to resume his thorough polishing and walked towards the stairs in order to reach the second floor, where Harry's quarters were located. His door was closed when she got there and she wondered if that was some sort of hint for them to leave him alone. Either it was or not, she knocked and waited for an answer, unwilling to put up with any moody stalling.

"_Come on in,_" Mia heard his voice saying from the interior of the room, to her relief.

She found him sitting up on his bed when she came in, the wings of a golden snitch, given in the previous Christmas by herself and Sirius, peaking out of his closed hand as if he'd absently been working on catching it. He looked a bit nervous – worried, even. But at the same time he seemed relieved to see her there.

"Is it a good time to talk?" she asked him softly.

Harry nodded. "I thought you'd gone out with Elizabeth," he said.

"I did," she confirmed, closing the door behind her as she entered the room. "But it was getting late and we still need to get to the Burrow."

He seemed to gulp at the mere thought of it, likely nervous about running into Izzy after their squabble.

"So," Mia started, "first of all, I think I owe you an apology for the way I've been acting, Harry."

Harry seemed confused at that. "What do you mean?"

She sighed. "I've been avoiding you for the past few days, Harry. Ever since you told me about…" she paused, feeling a lump in her throat as she tried to say it – it was still hard to acknowledge "… about your plans to leave after your birthday. I didn't do it on purpose, really… and I should have known how to handle that better. So, I'm sorry. I should have been there for you in a better way."

"It's okay. Everyone needs time sometimes," he told her easily before the look on his face became sort of tentative. "Does this mean that now you're… okay with me going away?"

She pondered if she should lie and tell him she was, just so he'd be less concerned or if she should simply be honest. A dilemma of sorts. But at the same time she clearly knew that lies tended to bring resentment and that was the last thing she wanted to stand between herself and Harry. Honesty was the safest bet. "You know, Harry, I don't think I'll ever be fully… _okay_ with you leaving. It's hard letting your children go, especially when you know the path they'll be taking is full of dangers – one day, when you have your own children, you'll feel that too," she explained softly as Harry listened attentively. "But I understand that it is what you have to do and that's enough for me to live with it. I can't be wasting time stressing over it when I could be using it to help you." Part of her would always be anxious for his safety – she couldn't deny it – but she'd never forgive herself if something happened to Harry because she'd been too caught up with her own issues to help him with his own…

"I… er, thanks," he said, not quite sure of how to show his gratitude. A bit hesitantly, he hugged her – he'd never been one for hugging, really, but that time he knew his godmother deserved it without a doubt.

He felt lucky – very lucky. Many parents, guardians or godparents would have simply said 'no'. Many wouldn't have made such an effort to understand and to help him in what he has to do because they would rather ignore the problem existed so they could leave it for someone else. He would always be thankful that it wasn't the case with his family…

"Well," Mia started, as both pulled away from each other's hold, "now that we're done with this issue – for the moment, at least – there's something else we've got to talk about, Harry."

"Sirius has already mentioned what happened this afternoon with Izzy," he guessed easily – he'd actually been expecting her to bring that up ever since she'd walked into his room.

Mia nodded. "He gave me an outside perspective of it," she declared. "Do you have anything to add?"

He shrugged and looked down. "Not really – there's not much more to say. I left Izzy out of this plan up until today. I didn't think it would bother her much but apparently I've been leaving her for last in a lot of things… She's got a right to be upset at me – I'd feel just the same if the situation had been the inverse." In fact, he _had _felt just that way back when the Order had been created and he hadn't been allowed to join even though he's been Voldemort's main target from the time he was an infant. He understood _perfectly._

"You didn't do it on purpose," Mia pointed out, resting a hand on his shoulder, hoping her words would get through her godson's self-blaming ways. "Izzy will know that once she's cooled down a little."

"Still," he countered. "I didn't even realize I was doing it until she told me this afternoon. What does that say about me?"

"It says you have a whole lot of things to worry about," Mia told him. "Izzy does have a right to feel upset for being the last one to know about your intentions to leave and, well, all other things but you also have a right to get a break from time to time for everything you have to deal with. Knowing Izzy, I'm sure she'll understand that too – she can be a fairly reasonable person… provided she'd not running on fumes of rage."

"Well, that's still not the casa by the time we get to the Burrow," Harry mumbled, mostly for himself.

Mia chuckled. "I'm sure the Weasleys are working on that. In any case, I can go check before you go and talk to her yourself."

He huffed at that. "What am I supposed to tell her?"

"The truth," Mia said simply. "That you're sorry and didn't mean to hurt her."

"I've already said that…"

"Then say it again. People are much more receptive after having the time to vent about whatever is bothering them. Just be honest, Harry, and all should be okay." Mia sighed. "I don't think I need to tell you that I don't like seeing you and Izzy at odds but at least you two never managed to stay angry at each other for more than one or two days in a row. Hopefully, you haven't gotten any better at it."

He couldn't help letting out a faint laugh at that. "Hopefully," he agreed before sighing. "She thinks I don't treat her as a friend anymore. Just as a sister."

"Well, then show her she's wrong," Mia told him.

* * *

It was a usual Tuesday as far as her brothers were concerned, Ginny thought. Or, well, a Tuesday as usual, spent dealing with their mother's wedding fever and that ended up with guests coming over.

As she sat the tables outside, she could identify many sounds coming from the house: her father telling Remus, who'd just arrived with Tonks, both having just been invited for Dinner, about a broken mobile 'fellitone' he'd gotten a hold of recently; the radio Quidditch commentary announcing the Chudley Cannon's ongoing smashing under Puddlemore United's heavy fist, followed by Ron's moans of disappointment; Bill and Charlie discussing a wager on by how many points the losing team would be defeated; and, finally, the twins singing the Cannon's anthem, replacing several words of the lyrics with insults and curse words, for their mother's chagrin. A Tuesday as usual indeed.

Hoping to fetch the cutlery for the table, Ginny made it back into the house and quickly spotted Izzy at the living room sitting with Tonks – while her best friend had happily offered to help her setting the tables, her mother had been quick to dismiss it, claiming that there was no need for guests to put their hands to work. Well, it was probably for the best that Izzy stayed in the living room instead of the yard or the kitchen, where Harry was bound to apparate or floo to at any moment – Ginny really wanted to have a word with her boyfriend before Izzy had a chance to.

It wasn't that she wanted to yell at him or anything. Well, maybe she'd give him a little of grief for being quite thick. But, truth was, she could understand both parts – why Izzy felt so left out and why Harry had caused that, no doubt without intending to. He'd made the decision with Ron and Hermione because, at the end of the day, they'd be the ones on his side during his odyssey, then her because she was his rock… and finally his godparents because it was his blessing he needed the most. Izzy had, in a way, unwittingly been left out of it all. No one had seen it coming, no one liked it. It just happened. And Ginny hoped, for her best friend and her boyfriend's sakes, that they would be able to make amends despite that.

A cracking sound filled her ears just as she stepped outside and Ginny quickly spotted Harry standing with Kreacher a few yards away from the front door, apparently thanking him for something before the house-elf disappeared again – seemed Harry had side-along apparated with him,

Sirius and Mia appeared too, a few seconds later, respectively holding Mary and Alex closely through the process of apparition. They greeted her warmly on their way into the house and, after Mia inquired about her daughter's whereabouts, quickly stepped in while Harry remained outside, nervously looking at her. Ginny could just tell he was waiting for her to yell or something…

But before she could approach and say anything, Harry did do himself, surprising her with his words. "I'm a dolt, I know."

She just looked at him in disbelief for a few seconds before managing to find her voice. "Go on…"

And he actually did. It was a bit bizarre just standing there as he proceeded to take fault for pretty much every point she had intended to give him not more than a little grief over while also calling himself a bunch of names from dim-witted to thick. It was sort of mad and also adorable at the same time, actually. If he could get her off guard like that, she gave Izzy five minutes before she forgave him in tears…

By the time he was done, not quite a couple of minutes after starting, Ginny was biting her lower lip to keep the laughter from sounding as he just looked at her expectantly. "Well?" he asked.

"Well what?" replied Ginny.

He furrowed his brows. "Don't you have anything to say?"

She nodded. "You're a pretty odd bloke, you know?"

"Er… yeah," he awkwardly agreed. "But I actually meant if you had anything to add to what I said…

"Honestly, I'm pretty sure you've already covered all bases," the redheaded pointed out with a chuckle. She reached for his face and patted his cheek lightly. "If you're going to spare me from having to yell at you like this often, I think we have a brilliant future ahead of us."

He looked at her oddly. "That's all?"

"Pretty much. I was actually going to take pity on you and let you off the hook after a couple of minutes of lecturing as far as I was concerned but, hey, you taking care of that yourself was just as fine to me. A bit more amusing, even," she said with a smirk.

"Hum… I was sort of expecting you to stick with Izzy against me… like she took your side when she thought we'd actually broken up after Dumbledore's…"

"Yeah… let's say I find your idiocy a bit understandable this time around," his girlfriend informed him. "Disappointed?"

"Not particularly," he admitted.

"It wouldn't hurt if you did make an effort to look like I'd just kicked your puppy when you see Izzy, though," Ginny stated. "She might get a kick out of it and find you pitiful enough to let your case rest."

"Right," he mumbled. "On a scale of one to ten, how upset is she at the moment?"

Ginny thoughtfully scratched her chin, pondering her answer. "Three… maybe two."

He raised his eyebrows. "Just that?"

"Oh, don't look so surprised. She was really furious when she got here – you could practically see her steaming. Definitely a twenty in your one to ten scale then. But then my Mum made me go try on this stupid dress and I had to leave her alone with George for a while… surprisingly when I got back she didn't look half as furious."

Harry looked surprised. "Really? What did he do? Did he… did he slip her some of his products?"

"You never know but I doubt it. His version is that they spent the whole time snogging," she said, making Harry's eyes nearly bulge out of his skull. "But, once again, I don't think so – first because she didn't have a hair out of place when I got back, second because we both know you can't believe anything Fred or George say without it going through a thorough scrutiny first…"

"Oh, that's… that's true," Harry admitted, still slightly disturbed. "So, is it safe to go talk to her now?"

Ginny lifted a finger, telling him to wait and moved towards one of the living room's windows, she spotted her best friend having words with Mia at one of the sofas at the same time she heard Sirius apparently arguing with Tonks about which one of them little Mary liked the most. Near the radio, Fred and George seemed to have taken Alex under their wing as he sat on one of their laps, being taught how to cheer for Puddlemore United, to Ron's annoyance.

"I think now is as safe as it gets," Ginny informed him.

Harry sighed and nodded, letting out a long breath before taking a step towards the house's door.

"Wait!" Ginny told him. "There's something else you should know."

He stopped and turned to her, eyebrows rose. "What?"

"Izzy feels left out," she said.

"Oh," Harry responded. "I figured that much."

"No, Harry. Not just about you not telling her about your plans until today. She feels like you may be drifting apart for good. Like now you have a new circle of trust that's me, Ron and Hermione and she's not part of it anymore."

"That's… that's completely ridiculous," he said defensively. "Of course I trust her!"

"Good. Then go tell her that. Or rather…" she looked again at the living room through the window and counted at least ten people in there – Merlin, that was a bit crowded. "Why don't you go to the shed and I get her there instead? No need for you to make your heartfelt apology in front of a crowd."

She did have a point there, Harry pondered. He nodded finally. "Okay."

Ginny gave him a short smile and approached him just to quickly kiss him on the lips. "Good luck," she said before turning around and walking away.

He thanked her and made his way to Mr. Weasley's usual domain as Ginny went to fetch his sister. Inside the shed, there was scrap everywhere, mostly objects he used to see at his Muggle studies class. A toaster, a lawnmower… even what seemed to have been a vending machine like the kind there was all over the Muggle side of King's Cross. Who knew, maybe Mr. Weasley had gotten it from their rubbish…

A large rectangular table surrounded by a few dozens of chairs rested in a less messy corner and Harry assumed that was the spot reserved for Order meetings, now that they had moved the headquarters from his parents' old house in London to there.

He heard the door of the shed opening behind him and turned around to see Izzy stepping in, arms crossed against her chest. There was an awkward look on her face as she looked at the room around her and he wondered what she was thinking. It didn't matter, though. He was there to make amends and that was what he would do. No time to waste.

"I'm sorry," was the first thing he told her.

Her eyes finally met his and he sighed. "Harry…"

"No, let me just finish," he pleaded. "I'm _really_ sorry. I'm an idiot and you were right – I've been leaving you for last in a lot of things lately and, honestly, I didn't even notice it until you told me before. It's not because I don't trust you. It's not because I don't see you as a friend but just as a sister. Well… maybe _I_ was just treating you as a little sister for a while but… just a little. Mostly, I didn't tell you because…" he paused, thinking his words through "…because I guess I took you for granted. I got new friends, that's true, but that doesn't mean I forgot we were friends too – I suppose I just assumed that because we'd been friends for so long… I wouldn't have to worry about you thinking otherwise. And I shouldn't have. So… I am really sorry. I am."

Neither spoke for some long twenty seconds after that. It was positively frustrating, especially for Harry who stood there, among scrap of all kinds, wondering if his apology had worked.

When Izzy did speak, it wasn't to say anything he expected. "Ginny didn't really yell at you, did she?"

"Er…" he started.

"Because she sort of avoided the question when I asked if she was too hard on you. She usually does that when she doesn't want to say the truth but doesn't want to lie either…"

"She figured you'd feel a little… pleased if you thought I'd already heard it," Harry justified. " I actually did most of the lecturing to myself – she didn't have much more to say. So, Sor…"

"Don't apologize!" she told him suddenly. "Just don't, okay?"

"Izzy…"

"Because I owe you my share of apologies too," she said.

He was taken aback. "What?"

"I talked to George. And then I talked to Ginny. And now to Mom. You know what all said? That whatever the reason why you left me for last, you'd never have done it if you thought it would hurt me. And then you made that whole speech that just confirmed that." She sighed, then. "I was kind of a brat by walking away without letting you explain yourself."

"Well, I was sort of an idiot so…"

She laughed. "Yeah."

"And I know you think you're out of… 'the circle of trust'. Ginny told me. I should probably point out there's no such thing."

Izzy rolled her eyes. "Yes, there is."

"No, there isn't."

"Yes. There _is_. Maybe it's not called 'the circle of trust' but you four form sort of… an exclusive group that it's pretty hard to infiltrate, Harry. George says it's about couples and stuff."

"Er… Ron and Hermione are not a couple," he told her.

Izzy rolled her eyes. "And how long do you think that's gonna last? Listen, the point is that… you're a group and I'm outside of it. I'm the fifth wheel, according to George. I know caring about this sounds stupid and… petty but it sort of sucks, Harry. We used to be _the _group."

"The fifth…" He shook his head as it sounded so absurd to him. "Look, it's not… Ron, Hermione, Ginny and I are not a group. There's me, Ron and Hermione and then there's me and Ginny. We're not an exclusive club just… best friends. And if there's any exclusive club in this whole story, that would be the one called Harry and best friends. And you can bet you're part of that one too – it runs just fine with five wheels even though, well, haven't been doing a great job in maintaining one of them. I promise I'll work on it, though…"

She couldn't help chuckling at his metaphor and sighed. "So… five wheels work too?"

"It helps supporting the weight and there's a lot of it," he told her. "I know it's not easy on you. Being my sister. Lesser people would resent me for getting so much of their parents' attention."

She shrugged. "Honestly, I don't think I'd want that type of attention on me, Harry. No offense."

He shook his head. "None taken."

A short pause followed his words – both of them knew by then that they were okay again. Or very close to. It was a relief.

"So, you're leaving," Izzy murmured. "Chasing Horcruxes."

He nodded. "I have to. You're not going to insist I take you too, are you?"

"Oh, I've been preparing my argument all afternoon," she informed him.

"Izzy…"

"But Ginny convinced me to stick with her deal and don't bug you about it until I'm of age," she told him. "It does make sense if you put it in perspective."

Thank Merlin for that, Harry thought. He simply didn't have the power to talk someone out of going into the Horcrux hunt at the moment…

Izzy continued. "But if you die, you'd better hope the two of us end up in very different ends of the afterlife because I'll hex you senseless just as soon as I land my eyes on you over there. And I can name a handful of people who would help me with it."

He raised his eyebrows – she did mean it, he knew. Izzy didn't make promises she didn't intend to keep. "I'll add that to my list of incentives to win, then," he told her, before taking a deep breath and sitting on a working bench. The responsibility, the risk, the unknown he was about to face. "Do you want to be the first one to hear a secret?"

She grinned. "That would be a change," she observed in a mock-resentful tone.

He didn't smile back, so she guessed it had to be something _really _serious…

"Sometimes I wish he'd picked Neville. Voldemort, I mean," Harry confessed, his eyes falling to the floor. "And then I hate myself for thinking it because Neville is as close as anyone gets to a sixth wheel in that exclusive 'Harry's best friends' club…" He looked up at her, troubled. "Does that make me an awful person?"

It was awful, yes… but she couldn't blame Harry for wondering, Izzy thought. A prophecy that could mean one of two boys… fate could have easily taken a different turn. "No," she finally responded. "It just makes you human." After all the grief he'd had to deal with… more than anyone, Harry had a right to wonder what would happen if such turn had been taken. "A bad person would be someone who resented Neville for not having been picked as the Chosen One. And I know you too well to even wonder if that's the case."

Harry nodded quietly and silence filled the shed for the third time that day… They'd be in charge of Hogwarts in the following year. Izzy, Ginny, Neville and even Luna. He trusted them to keep each other safe – he had to. Hopefully, when it was all over they would just sit down and reminisce.

He looked up at Izzy to thank her for what she'd said but forgot it when he saw the uncomfortable expression covering her face once again as she observed her surroundings. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she said, quickly.

"Liar," he said.

Izzy bit her lower lip a little. "It's just… I'm pretty sure Fred shagged Angelina somewhere in this shed a few hours ago…"

"Oh…" Harry mumbled. Somewhere in that shed… including the workbench he was sitting on, he thought all but jumping off it in horror. "Let's just… get out of here now."

"Sounds good to me," Izzy agreed eagerly.

**A/N: Not much to say now - I hope you liked the chapter. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	38. Diagon Alley

**15 July 1997**

It felt odd how quickly a couple of weeks could pass when one was fighting against time. That left two weeks to the wedding… two weeks until Harry had to leave in his crusade, two weeks to make sure he was ready…

It was helping him bear his burden that helped Mia accept there was no away around it. Nearly every day, she would sweep over and over through every book in the library of Grimmauld Place with the word 'defence' in it – which happened to be a _lot _of them. She would gather spells, practice them with Sirius and then they would teach them to Harry together.

Izzy had mostly become stuck as the target for her brother to practice on, as he found it too disturbing to use his godparents as such. She seemed to be pretty satisfied in that position, saying that 'at least she was learning something out of the whole thing', and happy to be included. In the rare occasions she didn't step in as the target, it was mostly Ron serving as such as Harry couldn't bring himself to attack Ginny when she offered herself for that purpose, no matter how much she encouraged him, saying it was fine.

The fifth of July started out as a regular week day, with Sirius and Mia giving Harry his daily defence lessons in the morning and letting him rest the afternoon. Ginny came by shortly after lunch, to help Harry going through his mother's diaries. He'd only just gotten to start reading them a few days before and had quickly realized that he'd never have time to go through all of those before his time to leave came if he didn't split work with someone. That someone, turned out to be Ginny.

Although he hadn't gotten to take a look at the diaries himself so far, Sirius already liked their effect on his godson – he seemed less… sombre, likely because he was indirectly gaining memories of his mother and not for someone else's testimony. Those were Lily's words and her words only – he was getting to know Lily through Lily and that was as close as it got to the real thing in Harry's case.

Plus, Sirius had to admit, it was pretty funny having Harry asking him about things that he hadn't thought of in decades like some prank he and James had pulled on the Slytherins, consisting of filling every ventilation shaft leading to their common room with hippogriff dung, which had caused it to become the smelliest incident in Hogwarts' history. Of course, in the words of twelve-year-old Lily, it had been an 'awful prank courtesy of that stupid insufferable bully, Potter, and his twin-in-spirit (Sirius particularly liked that title), Sirius Black'. Her opinion concerning Remus' participation was left ambiguous and Peter was simply described as 'that poor simple-minded boy'. If only…

It was little past three when, eager to find out if his godson and Ginny had found more equally interesting adventures in Lily's chronicles, Sirius made his way down from Alex's room – where he'd put his son down for a nap – headed to Harry's, where the 'investigation' was taking place.

He didn't quite have the chance to actually get in, though, as the scene he found opposite him when he reached his destination's floor had him raising his eyebrows instead. His wife happened to be standing in the centre of the hall, holding in her hands what seemed to be a stick covered with birds' feathers, which he identified as a feather duster, and apparently oddly using it to clean the inexistent dust off the stairway's rail. Trying to seem subtle – but not doing a good job out of it – Mia looked over her shoulder at Harry's door and gave a little jump when she saw him there, between her and the half-open door.

"Merlin, Sirius, just curse me with the worst spell you can think of, shall you?" she hissed under her breath.

"What are you doing?" he asked her in confusion, ignoring what she'd just said.

She gave him a very 'it's obvious' look. "Cleaning – what does it look like?" She pointed out, waving the feather duster in front of his face.

The look on Sirius's face clearly informed her he wasn't convinced as he snatched the feathery object from her hands. "Well, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this, but there are spells for cleaning, love. Or, you know, house-elves. Such as the one going by the name 'Kreacher' and still haunting this house like an angry Poltergeist."

"Language, Sirius. These days, that word is a major insult for most ghosts…"

"Hum-hum, love," he said, shaking his head as he touched her chin with the feathery end of the duster. "Don't try to get beside the point."

"What point?" she asked, playing the 'I'm not getting it' card.

"The point when I ask you why you are standing here, right outside Harry's bedroom, _pretending_ to be busy dusting the rails of the stairs," he stated.

Mia gave him an immediate annoyed look and quickly glanced into her godson's bedroom to see if he or Ginny had heard her husband's comment. They seemed to be too entranced in their reading to pay them any attention. Relieved, she grabbed her husband's arm and all but dragged him behind her up the stairs towards the upper floor, making him drop the feather duster midway through the stairway. She only stopped when they were standing right opposite the door of their bedroom.

"Secrecy, hum?" Sirius asked her just as they stopped. "Well, you've got me interested. What is so important that you can't tell me on the same floor as Harry?"

"Nothing," his wife mumbled, stepping into their room. "I'm just… I'm just keeping an eye on them. That's all."

"Keeping an eye on who?" he asked as he went after her. "Harry and Ginny? Well, I'd say they're old enough to spend time alone without getting themselves hurt by accident or something – especially when they're just reading diaries… but, you know, maybe that's just me…"

"Oh, just shut up, Sirius," Mia hissed in annoyance. "They're _all alone_. In Harry's room! Don't you think that's… awkward?"

Sirius shrugged. "Not particularly. I mean, I'm sure they've been alone in a room before."

"Not here at home, they haven't. In a _bedroom_, I mean," Mia pointed out.

Sirius raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Really?"

She shook her head. "Not that I'm aware of, at least. Well, they've been in one here at home alone with Izzy, with Ron, with Hermione… but when they want to spend time _actually_ alone, they usually do it in the Burrow or, you know, Hogwarts." She huffed. "I know it barely makes sense and that I'm completely obsessing over this but…" she paused and gulped. "What if Harry and Ginny… what if they end up snogging or… something?"

"They're dating, Mia. Of course they snog!"

"I _know_ they snog but… I don't like to think of it, okay? It feels odd and… so odd. Yesterday, I was changing his diapers and now he has a girlfriend and… it's weird."

Sirius snorted. "Blimey. You're really freaking out – where did this obsession come from? You were happy enough when he invited Ginny over yesterday."

"I know, I know," she said, helplessly sitting on the bottom end of their bed. "And I was fine, really fine. But then Ginny arrived and Harry said they were going up to his room to meddle with Lily's diaries and it just hit me. They were going up to _his room_, where they would be _all alone_ and you _remember _what we did when we saw ourselves all alone in a room at their age."

Sirius's lips curled as he sat by her side. "Yeah… good times."

"No, no reminiscing," Mia ordered, poking his chest sternly with her finger. "This is serious… and awkward. Very awkward."

"You're exaggerating it, love," Sirius pointed out. "By a lot." He reached for her cheek with his hand and patted it as he grinned. "My little prude."

She narrowed her eyes. "Oh, am I a prude? So, let's say, it wasn't Harry all alone in his room with his girlfriend but Izzy in hers with some _boyfriend_."

The look Sirius gave her was of deep horror – the thought itself was revolting in his mind… "She… how… er… that's completely different, love…"

"Oh, really?" Mia asked sceptically. "Because she's a girl?"

"Well…"

"You chauvinistic pig," she called him, punching him half-heartedly on the arm before he could finish that sentence. "It's a good thing you had a daughter – now you know what the father of all the girls you snogged before me felt like."

"Phew, I doubt any of them ever even heard of me," he mumbled before shaking his head. "But, hey, that's hardly the point! I thought we were talking about Harry, not Izzy…"

"No, we were talking about one of our kids being all alone in his room with his significant other and me not having any idea of how to deal with that," she said, sighing. "I wonder if… if I'm spending too long worrying about them growing up into adults too fast with this bloody war. Sometimes I barely remember they're teenagers too… and then stuff like this just catches me by surprise." She took a deep breath and leaned back, turning her face to Sirius. "Am I really being such a prude?"

"Let's just call you a 'mother hen'," Sirius offered before placing a kiss on his wife's brow. "Still a bit mental from time to time but…"

"Shut up," she said, groaning.

He chuckled and kissed her cheek, then. "Look, it's not like you've had any other teenager to raise before Harry. And Harry's not an easy one to deal with… I suppose that gives you… hell, _us_ a free card to freak out a little over what he and Ginny may or may not be doing in his room, which, by the way, I'm completely sure it's nothing."

"Oh, really, and what makes you be that sure?" Mia asked sceptically.

"Well, not to call you dumb or anything but it's pretty obvious, isn't it? It's _Harry_. How mortified do you think he'd be at the very thought of you walking in on him snogging Ginny? I think he'd rather jump of a window than risking that – if he and Ginny even get to do any kissing whatsoever this afternoon, it will be a bloody miracle." He was pretty aware that he was by far exaggerating his words but, well, what his wife didn't know wouldn't hurt her.

Mia sighed, slightly relieved by her husband's words. "I suppose you have a point."

"I always have a point – I'm enlightened," he said, grinning before pointing at his lips. "Now pay up. No good advice comes free."

Her lips curled a little before she pressed them to his own for a quick kiss.

Sirius looked a bit disappointed when she looked at him after pulling away. "Maybe I wasn't clear enough before. No advice comes free _or_ cheap. I'm afraid your bill is only half paid, Mrs Black."

Mia rolled her eyes before reaching to pat his cheek sweetly. "I'm afraid you're forgetting the fact that I get a fifty per cent spousal discount, Mr Black. Plus, you get… significant donations in a regular basis so…"

He narrowed his eyes. "Blimey, aren't you a knut-pinching prude?" he told her.

She glared in annoyance. "I'm not a prude – you've just said so yourself."

"Well, I've changed my mind – maybe I can change it back if you waive your right to the spousal discount," he suggested, smiling seductively before nodding at the bed they were sitting on. "And as for those donations…"

"Dream on. I don't give in to blackmail," she replied stubbornly just for the sake of pushing his buttons. "Now, go away. I have things to do."

No one could expect that pushing Sirius's buttons wouldn't lead him to push them back. "What? Spying on Harry and Ginny a little more?"

She narrowed her eyes at him and pinched his arm, which didn't seem to affect him even a little as he kept grinning. "Don't _you _have something to do? Someone else to tease, maybe?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," he pointed out. "It's been a while since I've last mocked Moony with everything that's been going on lately. I suppose now it's a time as better as any to fix that. I mean, unless you need me here to keep an eye on Alex and Mary…"

Mia shrugged. "No need. They should be napping for another couple of hours. I think I can handle them after that. But if you're going to see Remus, you might want to have a word with him so he would come by and help out with Harry's defence lessons. I know we've been trying to keep this quiet but I'm sure we can trust him to help."

Sirius nodded. He'd thought of him already – the kid needed all the help he could get and, with Remus around to help, he supposed he and Mia would have more time to investigate further about the Horcruxes, where they were and how to destroy them. Those had been left for second in their priorities as he and Mia had agreed that the first was making sure Harry didn't lack defence skills to face any threat that might come his way during the odyssey ahead of him. Still, as the time draw closer, it was time they got their hands dirty, starting with finding out where that fake Horcrux that Harry and Dumbledore had found in the cave – which they were still to see as Harry had resentfully shoved it onto the bottom of his school trunk and never looked at it again – had come from. "I'll have a word with him about that, don't worry," he assured her before smiling. "Aren't you going to give me a goodbye kiss?"

She smiled back, although in a rather cunning fashion, and kissed his cheek instead. "Don't think you've distracted me enough to forget my earlier point about kissing. After all, I'm a _prude_."

He huffed, shaking his head as he got up. "And they say _I _am the stubborn one."

She chuckled. "Oh, well, maybe when you come back later I'll be too busy to remember… Make sure you're back before dinner. And be easy on Remus."

"Aren't I always?" he asked as he made his way out.

He descended the stairs and stopped in front of the door of Harry's room. Just out of curiosity, he peaked into it and saw nothing major was happening – they were just laughing over something they read on one of the diaries. He thought of going in to ask them about it but stopped himself when he figured they were having a moment. He made a mental note to ask them about what it was about later.

Sirius resumed descending the stairs and made his way into the living room when he heard the sound of the Muggle telly playing something. He quickly spotted Izzy inside, apparently focusedly watching some sort of program airing there.

"You know, for someone who, just a few weeks ago, was all pissed off for being left out by Harry and company, you seem pretty fine with sitting here watching the telly while he and Ginny are right upstairs," he pointed out from the doorway.

His daughter turned to him and shrugged as he approach had. "Telly's not that bad. Muggles have funny daytime programs," she commented, pointing at the screen. "In this one, they give out stuff to people when they guess prices. Odd, isn't it?"

Sirius gave her a look of agreement as he raised his eyebrows and sat down by her side, watching as, inside the telly, a tiny man in a suit stood with a bunch of people in a futuristic-looking set. "Very odd," he agreed. "So, they just have to guess and win a bunch of things? Interesting deal."

"Yeah. But since they rarely guess it right, I suppose it's not that impressive," she observed with a shrug. "Anyway, about Harry and Ginny, there are times to be with them and times not to. When the times in question appoint to the likeness that I'll end up holding the candle as they go into couple mode, it's best to stay away before they get to the snogging."

"Blimey, seems like today every female in this house thinks those two won't do anything but snogging," Sirius observed.

"It's a reasonable assumption, isn't it? It's a pretty good opportunity, being alone in a bedroom and all," she pointed out.

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "Don't let your mother hear that – she's a bit sensitive today. And, by the way, that knowledge of knowing whether or not his is a good opportunity for them to snog had better not be backed up by personal experience."

"You do know I've had boyfriends before, Daddy," she pointed out testily.

"I'd rather not take that fact into account," he told dryly before clearing his throat. "Well, are you planning to stay here all afternoon watching the weird show on the telly or would you rather go to Diagon Alley with your favourite Dad?"

"A thousand times Diagon Alley," she said, eagerly getting up. "I'm going antsy these days from being confined to here, the Burrow and Lulu's."

"It's not safe for you to go out there on your own, Izzybel," Sirius told her with a sigh as he got up as well. It wasn't safe for anyone, but especially for people easily connected to Harry Potter – unless she was under his watchful eye, he wouldn't want to risk his daughter's safety by letting her out.

She sighed. "Will it ever be safe?"

"Hopefully. If it doesn't, we can always move to another country." He didn't like the idea of running. At all. But, Merlin, if they reached a point when it was the only chance, then so be it.

Unsure of her father's seriousness, Izzy just nodded. "Give me a minute to go upstairs and get ready."

"Okay. Tell your Mum you're going with me," he replied. "And ask Harry and Ginny if they want to go too."

She nodded and rushed up the stairs as he made his way down to the ground floor, where he waited for his daughter to return. Little more than a minute passed before she appeared at the bottom of the stairs, walking towards him.

"What did they say?" he asked.

"Mum said to have a good time and not to wonder away from you. Harry and Ginny mumbled something that I'm assuming means 'no' – they were pretty entranced in those diaries. It's like they've gotten them hypnotized."

"Well, Lily could be pretty eloquent in what she said – no surprise she'd be too in what she wrote. Maybe one of these days I should give a look at '_The Chronicles of Lily'_ myself," he told her. "Well, how do you want to go. Floo or apparition?"

"Apparition," she responded. "Better get more used to the feeling since I'll have to do it myself soon."

"One year and a half doesn't fit into the 'soon' category, Izzybel," he pointed out with a chuckle as he opened the house's front door for them to step out. They apparated out of a nearby alley and landed right outside the Leaky Cauldron's passageway into Diagon Alley.

There, they quickly saw themselves surrounded by the various shops the magical area of London held. Looking around, they couldn't really say that that day was a busy one at Diagon Alley – it wasn't deserted or anything but it still lacked the vibrant feeling of its non-belligerent days…

"Well, where do you want to go first?" Sirius asked his daughter. "I'd play the 'really cool dad spoiling his daughter' by offering you a small fortune's worth of ice cream but since Florean Fortescue's is closed…"

She gave him a wide smile. "Don't worry. You can spoil me with a small fortune's worth of the twins' products."

He showed signs of wanting to protest but then stopped himself. "Ah, well, at least you've got a good tast… oh, crap, don't look left," he suddenly told her, turning his face away from the mentioned direction.

Her father might as well have told her to look left as, being the curiosity too much, that was exactly where she looked, only to see Narcissa Malfoy exiting Madam Malkin's dress shop with what seemed to be black garment bag hanging on her arm. The woman's cold and sharp blue eyes turned to her seconds later and Izzy felt a chill running down her spine and finally looked away. But it was already too late, as the woman was quickly stepping in their direction.

"She's coming here, Daddy!" Izzy hissed under her breath. "Do something!"

"What? Stun her? Believe me, I'd love to but I'd rather not be arrested for assault," he mumbled in frustration. "Why did _she_ have to be here out of all places? And what does she want with us? I despise her just as much as she despises m…"

"Hello, Sirius," his cousin said in a cold voice with a small hint of… delight in it? No, that couldn't be right – his cousin would never be delighted to see him. Whatever had put that tone in her voice couldn't be good. At all. And that thought gave him the chills. Clearly, she'd just approached him to mess with his head.

He put on a cool face and turned to her as Izzy's arm remained around his own. "Cissy. I'd say it was a pleasure to see you but I think all of us here are smart enough to know that's not true."

"Always a pool of charm, aren't you, Sirius?" she said before turning to Izzy, who gulped. "And this would be… Annabelle, isn't it?"

"Isabelle," Izzy corrected instinctively before becoming very quiet again

"Isabelle, right," she said dryly, turning to Sirius again. "Not a very Black-worthy name, is it, Sirius? But then again, you weren't around to name her when she was born, were you?"

"You know I wasn't," Sirius replied to his teeth. He could curse her for mentioning that fact – one of the things he hated the most about having been locked up was missing his daughter's birth. Her childhood. Cold shrew, he thought. "It seems I was warming up a cell for your Lucius. How's he doing, by the way? It's been a year since he started shaking up with the Dementors. I hope you brought him a cake to celebrate – all in all, I'd say his new neighbours are quite an improvement from living with you. Maybe Draco will join him there soon since he's still wanted for questioning over Dumbledore's murder."

Narcissa gave him a chilling look. "You can gloat and mock all you want, Sirius, but Azkaban is very different now. And so are the Dementors. You try to make it sound like that place doesn't affect you anymore but it does – it terrifies you. You're damaged goods. Always were. And very soon, let's wait and see who's the one locked in and the one out." Her look was of victory when she saw Sirius's face harden and turned to Izzy, then. She guessed aiming for the daughter would be the final straw for Sirius. "It's still time to rethink which side you want to take, girl. Just because your father decided to dishonour his family, doesn't mean you have to stick by him – and if you know what's good for you, that's what you'll do. It would be a pity to waste such a youthful life…"

That hit just the painful spot and, before he could stop himself, Sirius was already reaching for his wand. By Merlin, he'd teach her to shut up! But just as he was getting ready to aim, Izzy grabbed his arm firmly – she had a pretty impressive grip for a girl her size.

"Daddy, don't!" she told him. "Don't let her get to you."

"Izzy…" he hissed, gesitating.

She ignored him and looked at Narcissa with determination. "I'd rather 'waste' my life fighting for the people I love than make it last fighting for people like you."

The blonde's look was of disgust. "Just like your father," she hissed before walking away, the sound of her heels echoing all over the alley.

Sirius stood where he was, tense and furious and really, really wanting to punch someone.

"Daddy…" Izzy said.

"That bloody _bitch_," he hissed. "How _dare _she…?"

"She just said that to get to you," she told him. "I could see she didn't care about which side I was on – she just wanted you to lose it. Maybe even attack her so she could get you into trouble with the aurors." She pointed at a group of cloaked figures standing outside the sweets' shop, who Sirius identified as aurors. They seemed to have their eyes still fixed on him, likely trying to guess whether or not he'd cause more commotion. "Let's just walk," she suggested.

He nodded for her sake and they did so, keeping a quick pace so Sirius would exhaust all that rage-induced adrenaline faster. The alley wasn't all that long, so they walked back and forth along it several times, the aurors keeping their eyes on Sirius each time he passed by then.

"Sorry if I scared you, Izzybel," he finally apologized around the sixth time they passed in front of Flourish & Blots, headed in the joke shop's direction – the walk had indeed calmed him down. Izzy, he noted, had her mother's knack for calming him down. "But when she said that to you… it just made me flip. It's my duty to protect you and that sounded a lot like a threat."

"It's okay, I understand," she said, offering him a smile. "I wouldn't want it any other way, actually."

"Well, do you want to actually go into the shop now?" he suggested, smiling back.

She nodded and they made their way to Weasleys Wizard Wheezes, which, not surprisingly, was crammed. Either the twins were genius enough to always keep the shop bursting with costumers or they had sold their souls to the devil for that purpose. That fact was that, no matter how empty Diagon Alley might be, WWW wasn't lacking in buyers.

They waved at one of the twins surrounded by a crowd of costumers and made their way through the crown to the counter, where the other one was messing with the cash register. As she approached, Izzy noted he had more freckled on the right side of his face than on the left and recalled Ginny's teaching about telling the twins apart. "Hi, George," she greeted him.

At the same time he calculated the change for a costumer, he turned to her and raised his eyebrows. "How do you…?" He didn't finish his question as he recalled the answer. "Damn it, Ginny," he mumbled before smiling at the costumer, giving her change and urging her to come again.

"What did Ginny do?" Sirius asked, curious.

"Oh, she told me how to tell him and Fred accurately apart. See, they…"

George covered her mouth with his hand before she could spill the beans. "Oh, no, you won't. That secret's not reaching anyone else's ears," he said, pulling her to behind the counter. "Why don't you get busy and run the cash register for us? Shop's pretty full. We could use a hand."

"Don't you have a cashier? The blond girl," Sirius asked, looking around for the perky young lady that was always behind the counter.

"Ah, Verity. We gave her the afternoon off – she has a date tonight," George said.

"You give her time off whenever she has a date?" Izzy asked sceptically.

"When the date is with Lee Jordan, yeah, I do," he told her. "They've been dancing around each other for months. We thought it would be fitting to give them a push. Anyway, are you helping out, or not?"

"How much would I get for that?"

"What, you want payment? How about our eternal gratitude?" George asked with a laugh.

"She's not gonna fall for that, mate," Sirius pointed out.

"Yeag, I'm not gonna fall for that," Izzy agreed. "I want… three galleons."

George's eyes nearly bulged out of his face. "Three galleons? For an afternoon working? Are you mad? Five sickles at the most."

"Well, good luck handling all the costumers with Fred," she stated, motioning to turn her back to him. "Hum, looks like that group over there's planning to buy. Get your hands ready, George."

"Wait," he said, making her turn around. "One galleon, then."

"Make that two," she replied.

"No way! One galleon and a box of chocolate frogs we've got upstairs," he countered. "That's my final offer."

She remained silent for a second. "The kind sprinkled with cinnamon?"

He huffed. "Yeah, the kind with cinnamon. Deal?"

Once again, she let a few seconds pass before her answer. "Deal," she finally accepted. "Just teach me how to work with this thing."

Sirius pretended to wipe a tear from his own face. "My little girl – a natural bargainer. I'm so proud."

George mumbled something under his breath before approaching the cash register to give Izzy a crash course on how to run it. "Remind me in the future to never hire you to work here. You'd drive us bankrupt in a week."

She chuckled triumphantly. "Shut up, George."

"Well," Sirius said with a laugh – five minutes around the twins and the unfortunate meeting with Narcissa was nearly forgotten, "I see my girl's in good hands. I'll be upstairs bugging Moony if you need me." He trusted Fred and George to protect Izzy like family and the shop's protection wards to do their share.

"See you later," Izzy said as he made his way through the little door behind the counter that led to the staircase leading upstairs.

There, he was quick to find his old friends' mate where he was, as always, busy rummaging to piles and piles of parchment.

"Well, I'd think you were gravely ill if I didn't find you here working like an obedient little soldier," Sirius commented from the doorway.

"And I'd think you were ill if teasing wasn't the first thing you did just as soon as you walked in," Remus commented in return, his eyes fixed on a piece of parchment as his friend closed the door, walked further into the office and took a seat on the chair opposite him. "You came in a bad time, though. I'm a bit behind on work today."

"_Behind_?" Sirius asked, exaggerating the shock in his voice. "Perhaps I was wrong and you're actually ill after all, mate."

"I did have to take a few days of personal time for health reasons," Remus admitted.

"Heath Reasons?" his friend inquired, surprised. "Full moon's not for another couple of weeks."

"Not _my _health," he said. "Dora's. She's been a bit… under the weather."

Sirius frowned. "What happened?"

"Well, it seems she got a bit of… food poisoning. From her own cooking," Remus observed, shaking his head with a sigh.

"And you let her cook?" Sirius asked him in disbelief. "You told me she couldn't boil water without melting the cauldron."

"I couldn't guess she could cause food poisoning out of a roast," he replied sheepishly. "Besides, what was I supposed to say? She really wanted to give cooking a try."

"But how come she got food poisoning and you didn't?"

He coughed nervously. "Well, as far as she knows, because my stomach is stronger than hers. The truth, though, is that I barely ate a couple of bites out of it before I started banishing little bits of food out of my plate every few seconds while I kept her talking so she wouldn't notice it," Remus admitted, a bit of shame in his voice. "Honestly, I don't know how she managed to choke down the whole plate – it tasted dreadfully. I think she was just trying to prove a point – convince me it wasn't that bad…"

"Maybe she used a taste-bud numbing charm," Sirius suggested in amusement.

Remus looked thoughtful as he nodded. "Probably. Anyway, the next morning – that would be the day before yesterday – she was, well…"

"Projectile?"

"Very much. I tried to convince her to spend the day at Andromeda's so she wouldn't be alone but she's stubborn. In the end, I decided it was best if I just stayed home and kept a look on her myself."

"But she's better now, right? You're back to work," Sirius imagined.

"Well, she's well enough to have gone back to work and for me to come back too and put things back in order in this shop," Remus stated, huffing and looking back at the pile of parchment on his desk.

"Mate, I do recognize you have quite an extensive job here as the twins' bookkeeper/accountant/manager/occasional nanny. But you were only gone for a couple of days – things can't be that much out of order…"

He raised his eyebrows. "Oh, really?" Remus asked. "Then let me show you something that proves you wrong." From under the sea of parchment over his desk, he proceeded to fetch what seemed to be a board covered with Muggle yellow sticky notes filled with numbers and a nearly untranslatable scribble. "_This_ is their notion of bookkeeping."

Sirius got a hold of it and couldn't help laughing hard and loudly. "Well, seems practical of them."

Remus didn't look amused. "Yes, I imagine you'd handle the situation similarly."

"The sticky notes are a nice touch, really."

He huffed. "Honestly, Padfoot, you're hopeless. Now, can I hope you'll come back another day for your dose of 'let's bug Remus' time if I tell you have work to catch up with?"

"You could if Izzy didn't happen to be downstairs helping the twins running the shop – and shamelessly extorting them for that too, by the waY. That said, you're stuck with me at least until the crown downstairs is manageable for the twins alone," Sirius said with a grin. "But I didn't just come here to bug you, mate. I also happen to have serious business to talk to you about."

Remus looked up at Sirius from his work and gave him a sceptical look. "Serious business."

His friend nodded and figured he might as well just get to the point. "We were hoping you'd agree to give Harry a few… defence lessons in your free time. Mia and I have been taking care of that ourselves but we can only do so much since, well, none of us has actually worked teaching defence the way you did."

The werewolf just looked at him for several seconds like he was sensing he wasn't just being asked to teach Harry for the sake of learning. "Is there any special reason for you to be asking me that? Something going on with Harry?"

"I'd rather discuss that with Mia present, mate. And Harry. No offense. All I can tell you now is that it's for the sake of the kid's safety – we all know he has a hard future ahead of him," Sirius said, taking a neutral tone. "Well? What do you say?"

"You know I'd never deny helping Harry, Sirius," Remus told him. "Just tell me when and where and I…"

The door burst open before he could finish and a rather pale Tonks walked in. Her usual colourful hair was a short brown mess, which made her look even worse. "Kingsley sent me away," she declared.

Remus got up in a flash. "Oh, Dora…" He reached for his wife's arm and guided her to the sofa, fearing she might fall flat on the floor if he didn't do so.

"The boss said my vomiting was distracting everyone from their jobs," Tonks declared. "Cheeky bastard lately, that one." She turned to Sirius, then, and managed a faint smile. "Hey, Sirius. Didn't see you there."

"Not looking so great today, are you, Tonks?" he asked, a bit concerned.

"I've had better days," she mumbled.

"Want me to go fetch a bucket for you?" he asked, half joking.

She shook her, shifting to a lounge position on the sofa. "I'm good for now."

"What happened?" Remus asked. "You looked better this morning."

"I did," she agreed. "But then I had my lunch and couldn't keep it down." She groaned and glared at her husband. "It's disgusting how you're not even a little green or ill."

Sirius bit back a chuckle and Remus just looked away, avoiding the subject.

"Mark my words, Remus. I am never, ever cooking for us again. _Ever._ I think I'd rather starve. You're in cooking duty for good."

"Oh, I'm sure he's got no issue with that," Sirius joked, earning himself a glare from his friend.

"Do you want me to take you home?" Remus asked his wife, conjuring a blanket with his wand and protectively covering her with it. "I just need to have a word with the twi…"

"No. I think I'll just… stay here on this sofa. I'm feeling less… weary now. No need for you to lose another day of work on my account. I…" she suddenly hissed and both Sirius and Remus just remained on their places, looking at her wide-eyed in alarm.

When she hurriedly ripped some sort of leathery bracelet from around her wrist, though, Remus seemed to relax like he knew exactly what was happening

"Bloody thing burned me," Tonks cursed, holding out the bracelet.

"What is it?" Sirius inquired, looking curiously at the object in her hand.

"New auror emergency summoning device," Remus explained shortly as his wife waved the plain bracelet around, trying to cool it down. "I hope you're not planning to go in that state."

"I'm not mad, Remus," she told Remus before turning to Sirius. "Stupid thing's a pain," she complained moodily, referring the bracelet. "We used to use the silent calling like we do in the order but a couple of idiots slept through a few calls and told Kingsley it was because it was _too weak_. A few days later, we had to start using this stupid bracelet things. Doesn't come out unless there's a call, by the way – bloody uncomfortable."

"What does it say, anyway?" her husband asked, getting up to seat by her side on the wide sofa.

"I don't know. Let me see," she said, straightening the bracelet in her hand.

Approaching the sofa and standing over Tonks just so he could spot the object in her hands, Sirius saw some sort of print on the inner side of the bracelet, although it was too small for him to read from that distance.

Tonks, however, seemed to be quite successful in reading it, as her expression quickly became darker. "Oh-oh," she mumbled.

"What do you mean by 'oh-oh'?" Sirius inquired immediately. "Is it bad?"

"Oh, it's bad alright," she mumbled.

"Dora? What does it say?" Remus inquired.

She gave him an actually concerned look and took a deep breath before looking down and reading the tiny print on her bracelet. "_Red Alert. All Aurors available report to the Ministry's Atrium. Massive breakout from Azkaban. Dangerous individuals at large. This is not a drill. I repeat, this is not a drill. K.S."_ She refrained herself from reading the last part saying '_P.S.: Aurors on sick leave are _dismissed _from these orders'_ as it seemed a bit obvious and anti-climactic_._ Instead, Tonks just looked silently at her husband and then at her cousin, waiting for their reactions.

'_Let's wait and see who's the one locked in and the one out,_' Sirius thought. Those had been Naecissa's words. She'd known. He could just bet she knew. The tone, the taunting… the garment bag she'd been carrying. He could just bet it had been a nice non prison-themed outfit for dear Lucius. Because if there had been a breakout, he was just sure Lucius had been one of the ones out.

"Well," he finally said in bitterly plain tone. "That is definitely _not_ good…"

**A/N: Hi! Sorry for the long wait. Again! But I got a new part-time job that's taking most of my free time. Writing just got even more complicated (but still something I always make an effort to do). I hope you liked the chapter. Feedback is always welcome. Review!**


	39. Paradox

**A/N: Well, I keep telling myself 'I'll update sooner next week' but time seems to keep sneaking up on me an awful lot. I suppose I'm still getting used to the whole working-student schedule. but, well, after weeks of madness, here is the chapter.**

It was hardly possible that anyone in Britain hadn't heard about the massive breakout from Azkaban. The news had been splashed on every newspaper, every magazine and every radio news report for the five days that had passed since it had happened and, ever since, a general sense of panic had spread among the wizarding community.

Clearly, the whole breakout had been a very long, very well planned event. Every single one of the dozens of Dementors in Azkaban had simply vanished, leaving the prison completely vulnerable. While the question in many's minds was 'How could they have done such a thing?', the one in Sirius's was simply 'How come this didn't happen sooner?'.

He couldn't honestly say he'd been completely surprised by the breakout as the Dementors' allegiance had been more than questionable ever since Voldemort's return for a whole myriad of reasons. They'd been on Voldemort's side before, after all, – which was always a bad omen since they tended to join whichever side promised to produce more despairing victims for them to feed on – and it was no news that rogue Dementors had been responsible for nearly a dozen attacks on clueless Muggles that year alone. Them disbanding Azkaban had only been a matter of time and the reason why the ministry always kept a couple of aurors at the prison to keep an eye on them – an unfortunate arrangement that time around, as the events of the breakout had sent one of those aurors to St. Mungo's in a critical condition and the other to an hospice, soulless.

In the end of it all, two dozen prisoners had escaped the prison and only two – minor criminals who likely had just used the opportunity to make a run for it – had been retrieved, leaving twenty-two extremely dangerous criminals, all branded with the Dark Mark, out and about – including, as Sirius had predicted, Lucius Malfoy, among other sounding names captured during the Battle at the Department of Mysteries and the one at Hogwarts only a few weeks back.

That said, the auror department, not to mention the ministry in general, was completely swamped – so swamped, in fact, that it had taken the Order five days to find a date and time compatible with most of their members' now insanely crammed schedules (in a way or another, because of the breakout) to meet in order to discuss the matter in question.

So, five days after the breakout from Azkaban at the agreed date and time, Sirius and Mia found themselves in the Weasley's shed waiting for the order's meeting to begin. They were the first to arrive, having gotten there hours to enjoy some as-close-to-normal-as-it-could-get time with the Weasleys, so the waiting part was the same old boredom up until more people started to arrive.

Mad-Eye was the first to get there, limping like never before and grumbling under his breath about Mundungus Fletcher's latest trouble, involving some sort of stealing bender – whatever that meant –, his betrayal on the crew he'd gathered for the heist (cheating them all out of the goods they'd stolen) and a not-so-well-plotted-but-still-successful escape that had resulted on the outlaw's whereabouts being currently unknown. _"As if we didn't have enough to worry about already, the little rascal just had to go, cause more trouble, disappear and leave the Order hanging as he parades around with all our secrets!"_ Mia had overheard the former auror telling Arthur Weasley just as Molly entered the room, hands covered with what seemed to be platters of appetizers.

Only Molly would worry about the catering in a situation like that, Mia thought.

She elbowed Sirius lightly in order to get his attention. "I think I'm going to lend Molly a hand," she declared, her eyes on the Weasley matriarch.

"And leave me here alone with my own boredom?" he asked, dramatically. "Why, you negligent wife. Leaving your husband alone to fend for himself."

She chuckled lightly. "I'm sure you can handle it for a few minutes. And look, Remus has just walked in," she said, pointing towards the entrance of the shed, by which Remus seemed to be greeting Bill Weasley. "Go play with him for a while Mia goes help Mrs. Weasley, honey," she told him in the sweet tone she tended to use when talking to their two-year-old son as she patted his cheek.

He narrowed his eyes at her mockery. "What am I? A toddler?"

Mia chuckled again. "Not really, but you can be just as clingy. And as pouty."

Sirius did pout before he had the chance to stop himself from doing so and then groaned inwardly in frustration. "I'll give you the pout, woman," he mumbled.

She laughed and reached to place a kiss on his cheek. "Go say 'hi' to Remus – we all know how much you like annoying him. I'll be right back," she promised before walking away, towards Molly.

By the time she reached her, the redhead seemed to be distractedly humming some sort of Celestina Warbeck song to herself as she divided the appetizers by several plates on the large oval table resting in one of the corners of the shed.

"Merlin, Molly. Are you running up for the title of the best Order meeting hostess of all time?" Mia asked the other woman, amused.

The redhead turned around suddenly, a bit startled by the sudden intromission but quickly recomposing herself. "Oh, Mia, it's you. I just thought it would be nice for everyone to have something to nibble on and a few refreshments," Molly said.

"I know, but you really didn't need to put yourself through all this work – mostly, everyone's happy to come by, sit for the meeting and leave just as soon as it's over," Mia pointed out, before reaching for one of the platters of appetizers. "Here, let me help you with that."

The other woman thanked her for the help as she passed the platter to her. "Oh well, it's not really that much trouble. Plus… I'll be seating this meeting out. Arthur says these matters are making me too stressed and, I have to say, I'm starting to agree. You wouldn't believe the headaches I've been getting lately. Well, I suppose this little… courtesy is my way of making up for my absence."

Mia nodded. "There was no need for that – I know what's like being stressed. And between planning Bill's wedding and, well, everything… No one would blame you for skipping this meeting over that. Appetizers or not."

"Well, I suppose the wedding has kept me in a working mood too," she admitted, sighing.

"It's hard to believe it's happening in little more than a week already, isn't it?" Mia asked her softly.

Her heart beat faster for every day they got closer to the date in question – likely, not for the same reasons as Molly's did, she admitted silently. For her, the wedding was the last day she could be certain that Harry would be around as he'd promised Ginny that he would attend it before leaving for his odyssey – after then, he could leave at any day, at any hour… She gulped silently and busied herself by distributing the appetizers by the plates on the table.

"It's hard to believe there is still so much to be done," Molly told her, sighing. "Part of me wishes Bill and Fleur would have waited for…" She stopped herself. "For when things become less… turbulent." She took a breath, then. "But who am I to talk? Arthur and I eloped in times like these – one just doesn't know when it will be over… the war, I mean. _If we let it control our lives, we might as well surrender. Better enjoy it while it lasts instead_ – that's what my brother Gideon used to say to justify his never-ending parade of girlfriends back in the first war." She shook her head, still a bit disapprovingly, but it was hard to miss the nostalgic look on her face.

"It will be over soon," Mia told her, trying to sound more confident that she actually felt.

"Yes, let's pray it does," Molly agreed, trying to put a smile on her face. "Well, I need to go get the refreshments."

"I'll give you a hand," Mia offered.

The redhead shook her head, then. "No need for that. Fred and George are just over there," she said, pointing towards one of the work tables, by which her sons stood, plotting looks on their faces. "I think it's time I put them to work… oh, Elizabeth, it's good to see you," Molly said just as Elizabeth approached them, greeting her back. "Well, you'll have to excuse me now." And with that, Molly retreated to the door, all but dragging her twin sons behind her, protesting, as she passed by them.

Alone with her best friend, Mia turned to her with her brows furrowed. "Well, what do we have here? Arriving to the meeting ten minutes early? Who are you and what have you done with the real Elizabeth Harper?"

"What? It's not like I'm always late," Elizabeth protested.

"No. Only nine out of seven times," Mia observed.

"Two out of three… at the most," her friend corrected. "Oh, if you're just going to stand there and mock me, I'll go talk to somebody else. Sirius is rubbing off on you too much."

"Yes, he's a terrible influence," Mia had to agree. "So, anyway, if I'm allowed to ask, what has caused this early arrival?"

Elizabeth sighed and reached for one of the appetizers on the table, nibbling on it in frustration. "Well, I'm hoping to be able to land my eyes on…" she paused before saying Kingsley's name – they were still adamantly keeping their relationship a secret, after all, for their own safety "… you know who – and by that I don't mean _the _you-know-who – for more than five minutes in a row. It's been a nightmare the past few days – the guy has barely been able to leave the auror department since this breakout happened. Last night, he came home past midnight and had to leave before dawn. It's mad…"

"Wait, you two are living together already?" Mia asked, surprised

Elizabeth shrugged. "Well, not _officially_. But he spends the night like eighty percent of the time, so take your own conclusions. Anyway, these past few days – they've been driving me mad, Mia."

She could imagine Elizabeth's frustration. A career as an auror was always a demanding one, especially in times like the current – thankfully, Sirius hadn't picked it for himself or she would certainly be in the same shoes as Elizabeth. I did occur to her that Harry wanted to become an auror too but, hopefully by the time he got to it, things wouldn't be half as hard as they were these days. Not hopefully – certainly. After all, Harry's future depended on Voldemort's defeat.

"It will get better, Elizabeth," Mia told her softly, trying to feel as confident as she sounded.

"It had better or else it's not our time together I'll have to worry about – it's his health. One can only take so much long days and nights," she observed, already in healer-mode. "Head-auror or not, I swear I'll drag him all the way home from the department if he doesn't give himself a break soon."

Mia chuckled. "We both know you're pretty good at handling forced breaks, after all, don't we?"

"It's my second vocation," Elizabeth declared, grinning. "And speaking of overworking fiancés," she whispered, watching as Kingsley stepped into the shed along with Tonks and a couple other aurors.

"Aren't you going to meet him?"

She shook her head. "Let him some here. I can't look too interested, can I? We need to keep up appearances. As far as everyone knows, we're just friendly acquaintances, after all."

"Don't you get sick of it? Having to pretend?" Mia asked her, more out of curiosity than as some sort of warning or advice.

Elizabeth shrugged. "Sometimes. I love him and, sure, I'd love to be able to shout it to the skies but I understand it's risky with him being the head auror and that making him an obvious target. If it were just me, I wouldn't even bother to keep the secret but my kids are the equation – neither Kingsley nor I want to risk them in the slightest. Plus, I've got to say, sometimes this rush of keeping us a secret thing becomes incredibly… sexy."

Mia rolled her eyes. "Of _course _it does," she said dryly. "Now put your straight face on because Kingsley's heading this way with Tonks and Mad-Eye."

She did as Mia said, almost impossibly so. The deliriously happy expression on her face became a perfectly casual one as she waited for her fiancé to approach.

"Mia, Elizabeth," Kingsley greeted them both cordially, standing strategically behind Elizabeth.

She turned around casually as Mia greeted the group and smiled in the same fashion. "Hello, everyone," she greeted, her eyes shifting to Kingsley just for a second. "I haven't see you all in a while," she pointed out, in fact directing her sentence only to the head auror.

Tonks raised her eyebrows at that for a second but didn't say a word. Mad-Eye was the one to answer.

"Plenty to do, Harper. Do you think we have time to socialize?" the mangled man responded unceremoniously.

Kingsley cleared his throat. "What Moody means is that the auror department has been chaotic as you probably imagine. We are working on lightening everyone's schedules, though," he swiftly provided, taking the hint. "We'd love to stay and chat but Moody and I were just heading to Arthur to have a word with him…"

Mia nodded. "It was nice talking to you," she told the auror as Elizabeth nodded by her side, successfully hiding a smirk.

The two men walked away while Tonks stayed behind with them. "You guys haven't seen Remus anywhere, have you?"

"Last time I saw him, he was by the door," Mia informed her, looking at the place in question and noting that Remus wasn't there anymore indeed. "Sirius was heading there to meet him – maybe they stepped out for a moment. Didn't you see before coming in?"

Tonks shook her head and shrugged. "Must have been behind the shed or something. Oh, well, he's bound to show back up soon, anyway…" she said.

Mia nodded. "How are you doing? Sirius mentioned the other day that you weren't very well. Something about a stomach bug…" she asked, a bit concerned. It wasn't very hard to tell Sirius had told the true, though there were signs of recovery: she did look a bit pale but not as ghoulish as he had described a few days before, and her hair presented a hue somewhere between brown and purple.

"Oh, that," Tonks said, like she'd been caught off hand for a moment. For some reason, a smile covered her face for a single second before she hid it with a fake cough. "It was pretty persistent but I'm feeling better now. Remus ganged up on me with my Mom and made me go with her to St. Mungo's this morning." She made a face about that, seeing as she wasn't a big fan of hospitals because the amount of time she tended to waste there due to her accident-proneness. "Anyway, they gave me a few potions and assured me this… er, bug issue would solve itself with time."

"Hum, doesn't sound like a very thorough diagnosis," Mia observed, frowning.

"Says the woman who hasn't practiced healing in… what? Six years?" Elizabeth pointed out casually. "You don't want Tonks here to give a line to line description of the diagnosis the healers gave her, do you? I don't – I get enough healing jargon at work."

Tonks quietly shot her a 'thank you' look, which Elizabeth replied with a smile, before speaking again. "Long story short, I'll be just fine. I'll save the… er, long explanation for Remus when he interrogates me about it later today," she assured Mia, biting her lower lip sheepishly. "Oh, look, there they are," she announced, waving at her husband as he stepped back into the shed followed by Sirius and a large group of Order members who had, apparently, been socializing outside, among whom were Lulu, Gabe, McGonagall, several other teachers and Amelia Bones.

"Well, looks like this is about to start," Elizabeth stated, sitting down on one of the chairs surrounding the large meeting table.

"Yeah," Mia mumbled, sitting down too. "Let's see what will come out of this."

* * *

Order meetings did last an awful lot of time, Harry thought as he peaked through the window of the Burrow's living room, his eyes directed towards the shed. Although he imagined there were bound to be at least a handful of boring moments in those meetings, he often wished to take part on then, if not for anything else, to know first-hand what was being done against Voldemort's advances.

It wasn't that he didn't trust his godparents to pass down the information of what was discussed at the meetings to him but sometimes he did wonder if they weren't softening it all up for him. As aware as he was they were doing everything in their power to make sure he was prepared for the storm that was coming – and he knew he could never repay them for that – he was also aware that they'd like to shield him from everything within their reach.

Harry sighed, then. He knew he's miss their protectiveness somehow… The time for him to leave was coming faster than he'd ever predicted. He'd trained and trained to get ready for any fight, any enemy that might cross his way. Ron had been there by his side all along and Hermione, in her time at her parents' home, had surely spent every waking moment absorbing all the information about Horcruxes she could get her hands on like a sponge – no doubt he could count on them to have his back. They had little more than a week before they were set to leave. And yet he barely had any idea of where to start looking for the Horcruxes.

He'd wasted time, he knew. Maybe irrationally so. But he still couldn't bring himself to rummage through his school trunk and retrieve the little note that had rested within the fake locket-Horcrux he and his late headmaster had found in the cave. It had led Dumbledore to his death nearly as much as Snape had – the headmaster had sacrificed his strength drinking the potion shielding the locket and, no doubt, Severus Snape or any other second-rate Death Eater would have never been any match to a non-weakened Dumbledore. But, instead, Dumbledore hadn't stood a chance. And for what? Nothing. A fake Horcrux and a note signed by some RAB person… He'd have to think of that soon, he knew – the clock was ticking, after all, and time was becoming a more and more precious good.

But in the meanwhile, training, preparing and researching couldn't become all he did. He knew it couldn't. There were other things precious to him that he needed to enjoy before everything changed, like spending time with Ginny or getting to know his mother through her diaries…

That last task had revealed itself to take longer than he'd expected before to the point that he'd ended up dividing it with Ginny and, not as occasionally, Izzy, who would sweep through the diaries and mark the most note-worthy entries for him. He wished he could read and absorb every word himself but, for lack of time, he'd have to leave for another occasion in the future – his mother wrote _a lot, _he'd come to realize. She could have become a writer at some point – a good one, he thought. He could honestly say that no other piece of writing had kept him half as interested – not even the half-blood prince's, or rather Snape's, potions book.

"Oh, Harry, I think you'll like this entry," Ginny's voice suddenly reached them, bringing him back from his thoughts.

She was grinning in amusement as she sat on the floor, her legs crossed and her back against the sofa where Izzy lounged while trying to fill in the Daily Prophet's crosswords. On Ginny's lap, rested an open book – not so coincidently one of his mother's diaries –, which she'd been reading since the Order meeting had started.

Although he'd intended to do some planning that afternoon – logistics, like what they had to take, how they would communicate when it was time to leave –, Ginny and Ron had quickly changed his plans, mentioning that Mrs. Weasley was getting suspicious of their late secrecy and that, in case she even got wind of his, Ron's and Hermione's plans to leave, she'd stop at nothing to try and keep them from doing so. And since she'd skipped the Order meeting and had been peaking into the room every few minutes, between babysitting Alex and Mary upstairs, it wouldn't be wise to just blatantly discuss their plans practically in front of her… How Ron would ever give her a heads up to his departure, was a mystery to Harry.

Also, the fact that a friendly Quidditch match between the Cannons and some Serbian team (whose name Harry could neither spell nor remember for more than five seconds at the time) was airing on the radio, didn't quite help getting Ron's head in the game. The figurative game, that was, not the literal one as, after all, he was so entranced by the radio commentary that the whole house could explode around him and he wouldn't give it a thought.

"What's it about?" Izzy asked Ginny, putting down the newspaper and the self-filling quill she'd been using to fill-in the words as she shifted her position on the sofa to a sitting one that would allow her to look over Ginny's shoulder and at the diary.

"Well, according to one Lily Evans's words, about a certain black-haired git – her words, not mine – related to one of us here in the room," Ginny pointed out in amusement.

"I'll take a guess and say the black-haired git isn't Sirius," Harry said, nonchalant, walking towards his girlfriend and sitting by her side on the floor. He'd gotten use to his mother referring to his father as a 'git' in her journals, among other less flattering names. But, honestly, midway through her sixth year's account, Harry could tell that referring him by such had become more of a stubborn habit than anything else… She had quite a temper, he'd come to realize. Reminded him of Ginny that way – it seemed common knowledge was right when it advised one not to mess with a redhead.

"Nope, not Sirius this time. He does feature a lot in this one, since it starts just a few weeks before he and Mia got together," Ginny observed. "I've got to say, guys, according what's in here, Sirius and Mia got caught _a lot_ snogging in broom closets. It's kind of a running joke, actually."

"Phew, no wonder," Izzy pointed out. "If Harry and I listed every time we caught them snogging around the house or at Hogwarts, we'd be here for a while. And note that Dad's only been around for the past three years. Isn't that right, Harry?"

"I'd rather not think of that," Harry mumbled, looking a bit embarrassed by the matter in question. He looked away, trying to hide the blush worth of a Weasley, and cleared his throat. "Er… weren't you just going to read something from the diary?" he asked Ginny, trying to shift the conversation away from the point where it stood.

"Oh, right," she said. "Here it goes – and brace yourselves 'cause it starts off a bit… strong." She took a moment to look at Ron, whose mind was still seemingly being controlled by the radio. "Don't you want to hear too, Ron?"

"Hum," he uttered dismissively – whatever he meant by that, was a mystery.

"Ginny! Get on with it!" Izzy insisted.

"Alright, alright! Merlin, don't get your knickers in a twist," the redhead said, clearing her throat before looking down at the notebook._ "I hate him," _she read._ "I do, I really do. I hate James Potter! He's such a… As if…"_

"Wait. He's such a what?" Harry asked, interrupting her.

"Hard to say," Ginny told him, showing him the page in question, only to reveal the end of the sentence completely scratched out. "Doesn't seem your mother could decide which insult fit him better. Anyway," she said, clearing her throat again before resuming the reading. "_As if it wasn't bad enough Dumbledore made him Head Boy (which, he's not as terrible at as I thought he'd be, actually), he also… he… he stopped asking me out. Just_ _stopped!_"

There was a general chuckle at Lily's words there – both Harry and Izzy could predict where that was going.

"Phew," Ron mumbled suddenly from his place by the radio, "get grief at because you do, get grief at because you don't… girls. You're all mental, that's what you are."

All three turned to the redhead and Ginny was the first to narrow her eyes at him in annoyance – if there was a foot-in-mouth sort of disease, her brother had to be the most severe case in the bloody universe, she thought. "Weren't you busy being mind-controlled by that radio and listening to your team being used to wipe the floor with, Ronald?"

The other redhead glared. "The game's on recess."

Before Ginny could throw back some acid response at that, Harry interrupted her. "Who's winning?" he asked, pretending to be even slightly interested – he was pretty sure that if he let Ginny start an argument, it would take a while to shut them both up and get back to hearing his mother's words about his father.

"It's a tie, actually," Ron declared as rejoiced as one would be if their team was ahead by a few hundred points.

Izzy sighed nonchalantly. "The Cannons not loosing… the world's really reaching an end."

Ron glared again. "You're one to talk – you don't even cheer for any team!"

"Sure I do. I cheer for whichever wins – never get disappointed that way. Maybe one day I'll find a team worth sticking with," she said.

"Not the Cannons, though," Ginny assured him. "I'd get physical if she even _considered_ that."

"No need. I'd admit myself into St. Mungo's first," her best friend promised.

Harry huffed and cleared his throat, then. "Guys, do you mind? I was hoping we could go back to what we were doing," he said, pointing at the diary in Ginny's hands.

"Anxious, are you?" Ginny asked him, one eyebrow raised.

"Ginny," he said pleadingly. "Please?"

She sighed. Those diaries were important to him – important enough for him to be determined to gather the most important moments detailed in them before he had to leave, no matter how short time might become. She understood why: happy memories made him stronger, family ties, friendly ties… those were things Voldemort would never have or even appreciate. He completely underestimated their power and that would always give Harry the advantage. She hoped that advantage would be enough.

Still, deep down part of her knew she'd never fully understand just how he could be satisfied with getting to know his mother like that – through a bunch of diaries. He didn't have another choice, Ginny knew, but still… She'd grown up with her parents around all her life. The thought of having to get to know them that way… it felt too little. Too faint. But maybe she was wrong, she mused. Maybe that way, he'd gotten to know his mother better than she knew her own – she couldn't honestly say she knew exactly what went through her mother's head and, through Lily Evans's written words, Harry could. It still wasn't the same as the real thing… The real thing was the one he had with Mia.

"Gin?" she heard Harry asking, pulling her away from her thoughts only to see him waving his hand in front of her face. "Are you okay? You went really silent for a while."

"I was just… thinking."

"Want to share?"

She gave him a smile and shook her head before reaching to kiss his cheek.

Harry looked at her in confusion. "What was that for?"

Ginny shrugged. "Nothing. And shut up, Ron!" she told her brother when he started making retching sounds at their very mild public display of affection. "Do I need to go get a pensieve and show you my memories of you and _Lav-Lav_?" she threatened, glaring at him. "They're pretty sickening."

He visibly gulped at her threat – mentions of his… fling with Lavender Brown still tended to make him awfully uncomfortable. "Oh, look at that. The game's starting again," he lamely said as the Quidditch game's commentary resumed on the radio.

His sister rolled her eyes at his words and turned back to Harry, getting a hold of the diary again. "So, where was I?"

Her boyfriend's lips curled. "My dad won't ask my mom out," he supplied.

"She seemed pretty annoyed about it," Izzy pointed out from the sofa.

"Asking out, asking out," she said, browsing through the page, "oh, here it is." Ginny cleared her throat again and resumed, once more, reading. "_…he stopped asking me out. Just stopped! And it's driving me mad! But why? I've spent years wishing Potter would stop asking me out and now he did. Plus, he's not acting like a complete arse anymore and can actually be… nice to have around during our patrols. It's bizarre… simply not normal!"_

"Well, that's just confusing," Izzy mumbled.

"Shhhh!" Harry and Ginny unceremoniously chorused.

"This is just getting interesting," the latter said before resuming her heading. "_It's got to be some sort of… ploy to mess with my head. Yes, that's probably it. A scheme… some sort of reverse psychology to drive me completely insane, which must be working for me to actually care that he'd stop asking me out. I wish I could actually talk to someone about this – I know if I go to Mia or Elizabeth they'll just over-analyze it and say that the reason why I'm feeling this odd is because I have… feelings for Potter. Which I don't – they're just convinced that, because they have boyfriends, everyone else has to have them too, even if it's the most insufferable, cocky bully in the school. Or was. I don't know anymore. Maybe I should talk to Remus. If there's some sort of ploy involving Potter, he ought to know about it. I know he'll never actually tell me about it but he's not much of a liar aside from when it's about his condition, so I should be able to tell if he's hiding something. Yes, that's right. I'll pull him aside tomorrow and ask him. Potter will be sorry if he's really been trying to mess with my head_." Ginny ceased reading and closed the book, then. "After this, she just goes on to list the hallway patrol schedule for the following week."

"That's…" Harry mumbled, half-amused, "that's… interesting."

"Aw, your Mom's falling for your Dad," Izzy said, smiling. "It's so sweet."

"Yeah, except that she's in complete denial," Ginny observed, also amused. "I wouldn't want to be in Remus's shoes when she does… I mean, _did _– I keep forgetting this has all happened in the past – whatever she was planning to do to him. Or in your father's if, for some reason, she ended up concluding he'd been messing with her head on purpose", she said with a laugh.

Just then, Sirius and Mia stepped into the room, coming from the Order meeting that had apparently met an end while they talked.

"Well, looks like you kids are having a better time than we've just had," Sirius observed. "Lucky you."

"So, what's so funny?" Mia asked. "If we're allowed to know, that is."

"Oh, we were just listening to something from the diary," Izzy stated.

"Harry's mom is freaking out because his dad stopped asking her out every day," Ginny supplied.

Sirius chuckled just as he heard that. "Oh, the big Lily/James breakthrough – believe it or not, that's what led them to get together. Let me know when you reach the part when she flipped and started yelling at him for that same reason and then ended up snogging him – I'd very much like to read that one myself. James was always a bit… hazy with the details."

Mia raised her eyebrows. "I should probably point out that you'd likely be the last person Lily would want reading her diary."

He shrugged carelessly. "I'll let her kick my arse for it in the afterlife – it's definitely worth it. Plus, James always swore she hit like a girl, so… ouch, Mia!" he complained when she shoved her elbow into his ribs.

"Oh, shut up, you had that one coming," Mia told him unceremoniously.

"Anyway," Harry said, clearing his throat. "How did the meeting go?"

Sirius groaned and shrugged before sitting down on one of the armchairs in the room. "Boring, as usual. No big news, really. The aurors are not getting any closer to catching the Death Eaters on the run, Bulgaria's sending their prison security specialist in a couple of weeks to create some sort of unbreakable wards to make sure there aren't more breakouts and, in the meanwhile, France, Ireland, Germany, Portugal and… I don't know, a bunch more countries have lent the ministry a few of their aurors to help ours guarding the prison – apparently, Amelia Bones had to call in every favour owed to her and to the ministry to get that. They're afraid to get involved in our war." Sirius sighed, then – and who could blame, them, really? War was messy and deadly – no one in their right minds would want to get involved in it. "Long story short, things are bad. There's nothing we can do about it. So, what use it there to worry more than usual?"

His words did sound practical but they didn't at all mirror his feelings – he wished they did. He was aware that there were over twenty Death Eaters, not mention hundreds of Dementors, more on the streets and that was far from a little thing… it put them miles farther away from safety. It was all a bomb, a big bomb, and all signs showed it was going to blow up very soon.

"So what?" Harry asked. "We just stand here and wait? Let those Death Eaters just be on the loose and hope they'll do something stupid and get caught?"

"We're all open to suggestions if you have something better planned, kid," Sirius replied in a calm tone – he'd expected Harry to ask such things. The kid was, after all, a fighter. It was a gift and a curse at the same time.

"There really are no clues of where to start looking?" Ginny inquired a few seconds later.

Mia sat down on the arm of the chair her husband was settled on. "There are clues, Ginny. Only they're impossible to follow."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry inquired. In his mind, that made no sense at all…

Sirius sighed. "It means what it means, kid. It's pretty clear that those guys are all probably hidden in one or several of the many, many houses belonging to their families. But here's the thing you've got to know about dark wizards' houses: they're better protected than the ministry itself. Wards, traps, you name it…" And he'd gotten a pretty bitter taste of just how dangerous those could be one year before when he's so stupidly had gone after Wormtail to the Riddle Manor and ran into an authentic minefield surrounding it. Shaking his head at the thought, he resumed speaking. "Honestly, why do you think my father turned Grimmauld Place into a bloody fortress?"

"Not just to keep the Muggles away. That's for sure," Izzy mumbled.

"Izzy's got it right," he declared. "Those people have got plenty to hide and little desire to be transparent – even with a warrant from the Wizengamot itself, the aurors wouldn't be able to get a toe into their property unless those bastards wanted them to. So, if have any brilliant plan to get around that and search every one of these homes that may or may not be harbouring those blokes, please feel free to share with the class."

Harry looked down for a second and pursed his lips together in frustration. His godfather did have a perfectly valid point – if those places were half as protected ad Grimmauld Place… they just didn't stand a chance. "Well, that sucks," he said after a few seconds of silence.

"Yes, it does," Sirius agreed.

"You know we can't fix everything, Harry," Mia said softly. "If we could, well, it would be just too easy."

"Easy wouldn't hurt," Harry mumbled. "I could really use easy. A lot."

"It's not how it works, kid," Sirius told him.

"So, what now?" Izzy inquired.

"Now?" Sirius asked. "Now, I suppose it's time for us to head home, don't you think? Hopefully, if that's not asking too much, we can have a calm rest of the day when we get there. The rest can wait for later."

* * *

Her husband's request for a calm evening _was _indeed asking for too much, Mia concluded later that day when she heard the house's doorbell ringing just as she'd finished putting little Mary to sleep – which would have been quite a problem if Mary's room, as well as Alex's, weren't shielded so they hear loud sounds that might disturb their sleep.

Who would it be at that hour? She thought, making her way down the stairs on her own, since Sirius was busy reading Alex a bedtime story and likely oblivious to the doorbell's sound. It wasn't very late – only half past nine in fact – but the fact that someone was at their door at all, especially when they weren't exactly expecting anyone, was odd on its own – after all, most people they knew used the floo when they came by. Showing up at someone's door these days was simply too much of a bother with the need for security questions, codes or other ways to verify one's identity… it would be too risky to simply ignore that process and let a potential impostor into their house.

When Mia reached the floor below hers, Harry and Izzy were standing on the hallway, both already clad in their pyjamas and looking down the gap between the stairways with eyebrows raised.

"Did someone right the doorbell?" Izzy asked when she heard her mother approaching.

"Seems that way," Mia told her, trying to sound perfectly calm. "It's probably nothing."

"Just seems a bit odd," Harry told her. "We're not exactly expecting anyone."

"People don't always announce themselves before going somewhere," Mia observed just as the doorbell rang again. "Now, don't be nosy, you two. Just go back to whatever you were doing," she told her eldest children before resuming descending the stairs, that time, only stopping when she reached the ground floor.

Kreacher was already there, trying to climb on a chair he'd clearly dragged all the way from the dining room in order to reach for the peephole. Feeling a bit of compassion for the old house-elf, Mia approached him and touched his shoulder. "It's okay, Kreacher, I've got this," she told him.

Kreacher nodded in return, then, and stepped away from the chair. "As you wish, Mistress." And then, he disappeared with a 'pop' to Merlin-kne-where.

Pulling the chair away from the door, Mia reached for it and looked through the peephole only to find herself staring at a less than happy Nymphadora Tonks. She reached for her wand in the pocket of her robes and used it to tap the door, temporarily removing the sound shields from it. "Tonks, is that you?" she asked.

"_Yes," _the other woman replied in a shaky tone before proceeding to prove herself. "_I… I… my name is Nymphadora Tonks. I'm married to Remus Lupin and I'm an auror… People seem to think I'm bad enough of a cook to give myself f…" _she paused and, to Mia's disbelief, sobbed loudly_"… food poisoning…"_

Mia opened the door, then, without a doubt that it was really her. "Come on in," she told the metamorphagus immediately, helping her inside and closing the door firmly behind them.

Tonks looked truly terrible – her eyes red and swollen indicating she'd been crying for a while, her hair fully brown again and her face looking so down it seemed like she was in pain… Mia immediately feared the worse.

"What happened?" she asked straight away. "Is it Remus? Is he hurt?"

Tonks managed to shake her head at that, indicating he wasn't but couldn't quite form a sentence afterwards. "I… he…"

"You should sit down," Mia told her, engulfing her and pulling her towards the chair that Kreacher had thankfully left behind. She was shaking, Mia noted – she wondered if it was for whatever reason that had put her in such a state or for the fact that it was unusually cold outside for a summer night. The Dementors, she thought. They were the ones behind that cold. Suddenly, that brought a startling thought to her mind. "Did you just walk here, Tonks? There's a bunch of Dementors on the loose, not to mention fugitives – you shouldn't walk around alone… especially in this state…"

"No, I… I apparated," the metamorphagus mumbled in a rather detached tone. "Elizabeth… she told me it was fine for now…"

"Elizabeth?" Mia asked confused. What did Elizabeth have to do with anything? Odds were the Elizabeth Tonks was talking about wasn't, well, _their _Elizabeth. "Nevermind, let's get you downstairs to the kitchen so you can have some tea to calm you…"

"Tonks?" she suddenly heard her husband's voice asking behind her. Mia turned around and saw him rushing down the stairs towards them. "What's wrong? Is it Re…?"

"Remus is fine," Mia interrupted him. "She managed to tell me that much."

"Oh, thank Merlin," he mumbled, relieved.

By the other woman's side, Mia used her wand to summon a blanket from upstairs and wrapped it around the other woman's shoulders just as soon as it reached her. Tears kept falling slowly down her cheeks, which seemed awfully out of character for Tonks, who was undoubtedly not a crier. That could only mean a thing now: something bad had happened.

"Tonks," Sirius asked her softly, reaching for her shoulder with his hand, attempting to offer her some comfort. "Tell us what's wrong. Where's Remus? Why isn't he with you?"

"He…" she gulped and took a deep breath. "He left…" she whispered, the tears falling more furiously as she said that.

There was a silent pause, then, during which Sirius and Mia simply looked at Tonks in disbelief. "What do you mean '_he left'_?" he asked cautiously.

She shook her head slowly, senselessly. "He just… _left_…"

"What happened? Did you have a fight?" Mia inquired, unable to believe Remus would leave his wife just like that.

Tonks shook her head. "No… I mean, yes, but… I told him I…" She took a long breath, then, as the scene replayed in her head. Remus's reaction, his words, him storming out… It hurt like a dagger through her heart

"You told him what?" Sirius asked.

She gulped, then, and closed her eyes for just a second. "I'm pregnant."

**A/N: Well, this didn't come as a surprise of you - cheers for those who guessed the nature of Tonks's condition (in my defence, I was way too tired to try and make it less obvious). that said, I hope you liked the new chapter :D Feedback is very welcome. Review!**


	40. Baby Steps

**A/N: Warning: really long chapter (are you that surprised?)...**

"There you go," Mia said softly, placing a cup of steaming herbal tea in front of Tonks as she sat by her side, not more than ten minutes after the other woman had arrived and broken the shocking news to them, which both Sirius and Mia were still struggling to register. "This should calm you down and won't do a thing to the baby."

The _baby. Merlin_, Sirius thought at hearing his wife saying it. He couldn't believe Moony was having a kid – he'd thought of that, of course, but knowing it was completely different. And, most of all, he couldn't believe he'd done something so… stupidly selfish. Left his pregnant wife. He didn't even know what to _think._

Sighing, he turned to Tonks. She wasn't crying anymore, thank Merlin – it just didn't fit her – and was huddled on a chair, sipping some sort of tea as her eyes remained on the table, showing her absentness.

"So, when did you find out you were…?" Sirius asked awkwardly, pointing at the metamorphagus's middle.

"This morning," she responded in a monotonous tone before turning to Mia. "I've already told you this afternoon that Remus had my Mom dragging me to St. Mungo's this morning because of the alleged food poisoning. Well, they ran a bunch of tests, didn't find any signal of actual food poisoning in me aside from the puking and ended up figuring out I was… I _am _pregnant."

Mia's face suddenly lit with realization at that. "So, wait, this afternoon when I was drilling you with questions and Elizabeth jumped in to stop me…"

"She knows," Tonks admitted. "The general healers sent me to the baby department and she took over my case when she saw me there."

"And? What did she say?"

Tonks shrugged, struggling a little bit with her thoughts at that moment. "She assured me everything was perfectly fine with me and the baby even though the morning sickness was pretty bad and had started awfully early on."

"Right," Sirius mumbled, still feeling rather awkward. "So, just how pregnant are you?"

Tonks stared at him, not finding any sense in the question. "One hundred percent, I guess."

Mia cleared her throat. "I think he meant to ask how far along you were," she said softly , turning to her husband and rolling her eyes at his previous question.

"Oh. Little over five weeks, according to her," the metamorphagus responded. "Five weeks," she repeated. Nearly right after Dumbledore's death, she absently noted.

"So, do you want to tell us how it happened?" she asked softly. "How things led to Remus leaving, I mean?"

Just thinking of it made Tonks feeling her nerves rising again. "I… I don't know," she stammered. "It's just so much…"

"Take your time," Mia told her.

The metamorphagus nodded and took a breath. "I was so nervous over telling him about the baby… and so happy at the same time. I mean, it's a baby – it's scary as hell but also what's not to be happy about? It's ours!"

Sirius nodded and smiled just a little, feeling more nostalgic than awkward at that moment. "We know what you mean."

She closed her eyes for a second because they were burning again. "I waited until after dinner and filled in some auror paperwork in the meanwhile to keep my mind occupied. He knew I was up to something – he usually has a sixth sense for this sort of thing. And then… I told him." She paused, then, recalling the scene. "He was shocked, obviously. Just sat there, staring at me. Panicking. And then he said it wasn't supposed to happen. At first I thought he was talking about us always being so… you know, careful."

"Protection is not always foolproof. All it takes is taking the potion one day later or forgetting to cast the spell just one time…" Mia observed. "We have three kids to prove that."

"Yep, none of them actually planned," Sirius agreed sheepishly. "Our little accidents."

Tonks bit her lip bit the corners curled just a little. Not enough to call it a smile, though.

"So, you told him you were pregnant, he said it wasn't supposed to happen," Mia summed up, urging her to go on.

Tonks nodded. "It escaladed from there. He said that '_his kind_' didn't have children and didn't marry – like it wasn't bad enough what he was saying, that he didn't want the baby, that he…" she hesitated "… he shouldn't have married me, it made me so angry he was calling… insulting himself by portraying himself as _just _a werewolf, saying they were 'his kind' when he's nothing like the rest. People like Greyback. Next thing I know, he was just walking out."

"Tonks…" Mia started, sympathetically.

"I waited," Tonks continued. "I waited for him to come back for an hour. I was hoping he just needed to work it out. But he didn't come and I didn't know what to do and then I thought…" She turned to Sirius with glinting eyes. "I thought you knew him better and longer than anyone. You could find him. I… I want him back, Sirius. Running away… this isn't him."

Her cousin nodded. "I'll get on it right away," Sirius said without hesitation, glancing at Mia and receiving a nod of agreement in return. "Did he give any indication of where he was going?"

She shook her head. "My guess is as good as yours."

He nodded, standing up. "Don't worry. I've got a place or two on mind."

She motioned to stand up as well but Mia stopped her by placing a firm hand on her shoulder. "And where do you think you're going?"

"To get him back with Sirius," she responded.

Mia shook her head. "No, you're not," she told her firmly. "It's not good for the baby or for you to walk around upset as you are, especially when for all we know there can be Dementors on the loose. Let Sirius handle this for you – he's good at this sort of thing and, honestly, what Remus needs right now is a man-to-man talk."

Sirius nodded and approached his cousin too. "I promise I'll beat some sense into him for you, Tonksie, alright? You stay here and relax – I won't come back until I find him, okay?"

Reluctantly but keeping in mind her newfound protectiveness over her child, Tonks nodded silently.

"Good," Sirius concluded, meeting Mia's eyes before nodding at the door, indicating for her to meet him outside.

They stepped out of the kitchen together a moment later, leaving Tonks at the table, and stood in the cramped space between the kitchen door and the beginning of the stairs leading up from the ground floor.

"I can't believe Remus would do this," Mia said, whispering so their friend wouldn't hear. "Doesn't sound like him at all!"

"The guy's got more issues than any of us can imagine. It doesn't justify it but still… it makes him unpredictable sometimes."

"Merlin, Sirius," Mia mumbled, expressing her disbelief. "Just… Merlin."

"I know," he said, reaching for one of her hands. "This is completely messed up."

"That's understating it," she said. "Make sure you let him know what an idiot he's being when you find him. I mean, look at Tonks! She barely sounds like herself at all! It's worse than when he kept rejecting her before they got together."

Sirius nodded. "Keep an eye on her, alright? She needs someone to talk to."

Mia nodded back. "I will. Actually, I think I'll convince her to stay overnight. Even if you get Remus to come back tonight, it's not wise to send them home alone right away…"

"You do that," her husband agreed before reaching forward and placing a soft kiss on her lips. "I love you."

"So you keep telling me," she replied, cupping his cheek for a moment before taking a step back. "Go put on a cloak before you leave – it's ridiculously cold outside for a summer night."

He nodded and turned around, climbing up the stairs leading to the ground floor and then the ones taking him further up, headed to his room on the third floor. As made his way up, Sirius made a mental list of the places Remus was likely to be. If he wasn't in any of them, Sirius honestly didn't know where to start. Merlin, was the whole situation exceptionally messed up… Deep down, he'd always thought that, of all people, Remus was the least likely to do a bunk from his responsibilities… The baby was his as much as it was Tonks's!

"What happened?" he heard a voice asking behind him when he reached the second floor, making him turn around. Harry was standing at his room's doorway, arms crossed and concerned look on his face. Unlike Izzy, who'd already gone to bed, he'd stayed out all that time between watching his godmother rushing downstairs and his godfather coming back up waiting, trying to get a hint of what was going on downstairs. "Was that Tonks?"

"Yep," Sirius replied shortly.

"And? Was there some sort of attack? Who died? Was it Moo…"

"Nobody died, kid," his godfather assured him.

Harry was visibly relieved at that but didn't look even a little less determined to find out what was going on. "What, then?"

Sirius sighed, thinking if he should just tell him about it or simply avoid the matter. "It's a complicated story, kid," he warned him.

"Simplify it," Harry replied. "I don't need a full report – I just want to know why Tonks was crying. She was crying, right?"

"She was," Sirius confirmed before taking a deep breath. "Apparently, she's got a bun in the oven."

Harry's face lit with surprise. "Really? As in a baby? And she's upset because of that?"

He shook his head. "She's upset because Remus freaked when she told her and made a run for it."

As soon as he said that, Sirius saw as his godson's face darken – no doubt he was angry with eyes narrowed and fists clenched. "He _walked out_? Just like that?" Harry asked in disbelief. "Is he coming back?"

"That's still to be decided, kid," Sirius replied quietly.

"Why would he _do _that? Why would he leave Tonks? And… and his kid?"

"Don't know that either, Harry," he assured him. "It's hard to tell what goes on in that bloke's mind. But you can bet your arse I'm going after him and I'll make sure he knows just how stupid he's being."

"Can I go with you?" Harry requested, hopefully.

Sirius shook his head. "Too dangerous for you to walk around the streets with just me in the middle of the night, kid. You know that's when most attacks take place – if anyone knew Harry Potter was outside and vulnerable today…"

Harry got it. And couldn't help pursing his lips together at that same, annoying reason as always. "Sometimes I hate being me."

His godfather patted his shoulder sympathetically. "You could do worse, kid. Let me handle Moony – we've known each other far too long for me to take any of his crap."

The younger boy nodded. "Bring him back to Tonks and their kid. Parents have no business being away from their kids."

Sirius sighed at his words. "I was, for a long time."

Harry shook his head. "You're different. You didn't have a choice and you also didn't know there was a kid in the first place."

His godfather's lips curled a little and he patted Harry's shoulder again. "Good kid. Now go back to bed – let me handle the lecturing. Merlin knows I've being on the other end of it enough times to give him one hell of a speech."

Harry couldn't help chuckling before turning around and walking back into his room, closing the door behind him with a bang.

He trusted Sirius to know how to handle Remus. He couldn't deny that. Yet, he wished he could take a part in it – it just didn't seem right. Him leaving Tonks. _Him_ of all people – he simply couldn't believe that. That someone he respected so much, the person who'd thought him in his third year how to fight back Dementors, would do something so bad. So selfish and cowardly.

His parents had died to save him. There wasn't a day that went by when he didn't remember that, especially after reading his mother's diaries and seeing how full a life they'd had before. How wrong was it that some parents were so willing to give their lives to save their children's and others simply walked out? He couldn't believe Remus was willing to make another fatherless child so easily, as if there weren't enough with the war that was going on.

Honestly, Harry wished he could shout it all to his face – maybe he'd set the bar to high for parents because he'd had two sets of such amazing ones but Remus… no excuse was good enough for him to walk out like that. None. And Harry would be damned if he'd let him make such a stupid mistake so easily.

But how could him reach his former teacher? How? He couldn't leave the house… well, maybe he could but he shouldn't. And, keeping in mind that, in a little more than a week he'd give his godparents with more than enough material to worry about by going away in his quest with Ron and Hermione, he supposed now was a time to spare her some worry… So, how could he give Remus a piece of his mind? How?

It occurred to him very quickly. Second year, he and Ron had crashed Mr. Weasley's old car into the Whomping Willow. And what had been Mrs. Weasley's response? A howler to Ron. That was it! Only, he didn't know how to make one, Harry pointed out in his mind. "Hum," he mumbled. "Kreacher?"

Seconds after he called, the old house-elf materialized opposite him. "Young Master call?"

"Er, yeah. Listen, you don't happen to know if there's any book in the library on how to make howlers, do you?" Harry asked, uncertain.

"Young Master don't need book. Kreacher can tell Young Master how," Kreacher informed him. "Kreacher see old Mistress make many howlers for Master Sirius!"

_Of course he had, _Harry thought, just a little amused. Knowing Sirius's relationship with his parents, it was no wonder he'd received a lot of those… "So, can you do it now?"

There was a sort of sadistic pleasure in the house-elf upon hearing that request – Harry imagined he missed watching old Walburga Black sending howlers to her least favourite son… "Kreacher be happy to."

"Great," Harry said. Problem solved.

In another occasion, he might feel awkward about sending a screaming message to his former teacher (and, according to Sirius, also future one when it came to defence). But, Merlin, he had it coming on him. He wouldn't go easy on him, he'd show Remus what a selfish coward he was being – he owed it to his own parents' sacrifice.

And, hopefully, at the end, it would all be worth it and he'd go back to Tonks

* * *

While Mia and Tonks remained back at Grimmauld Place, Sirius started his search by the not so long list he'd already made of likely places where his friend would be – sulking, no doubt. Thankfully, it wasn't a really a long list, which made his job easier… unless, by some reason, Remus had decided to go somewhere completely different from what he imagined.

The first obvious stop was his best mate's apartment with Tonks which was still irrevocably empty – any hope that he'd gotten back to senses on his own and made it back home by his own doing didn't last after that.

The second stop had been the Shrieking Shack, a place that had undeniably been the Marauders' headquarters back in the day – yet, with the exception of a few unknowing rodents, it seemed to be empty as well.

Third time trying was the charm. Or rather had been, sometime in a very recent past. By the time he'd reached the little cottage in the woods that had, once upon a time, been Remus's home and was still to this day the place where, every full moon, he transformed, Sirius had found the place empty of living presences but full of indications that it hadn't been the case little more than ten minutes before.

The burned down candle on the battered kitchen table was still warm and there was a pile of ash on it, which Sirius clearly remembered not being there after the previous full moon, during which he'd been in cleaning and repairing duty after his friend's latest 'wolfy episode' as he kindly refereed it. Had Moony burned something? He thought as he touched the ash. His friend wasn't usually one to express his anger on inanimate objects or on anything for that matter. Finding a little bit of red paper in the middle of the ash-pile, he was vaguely reminded of a howler burning off after it had done his job. But who would send Remus a howler? It simply made no sense at all…

He spotted an empty bottle of firewhiskey on the kitchen counter – a bottle, he recalled, they'd finished not long before Remus had transformed last time around. He'd been too lazy to dispose of it in the morning and had simply left it in some cupboard, Sirius vaguely recalled. Maybe that was it, then, Sirius figured. The bloke had needed a drink and had found the bottle empty. His guess would be that the most likely place to find Remus was, strangely, at a pub. That narrowed his list down even more.

Apparating away from the cottage, Sirius started his search with Hogsmeads' pubs, seeing as they were usually quieter in regular nights than the other ones he could think of. There was no sign of Remus either at The Three Broomsticks or at The Hog's Head – likely the guy was too worried about other stuff to even think of the quietness factor.

And so Sirius skipped to the third pub on his list – the Leaky Cauldron.

"Oi, Sirius!" he heard someone calling for him minutes later as he stood near the pub's entrance to Diagon Alley. Sirius browsed the room, first looking for Remus and then for the source of that familiar voice. He wasn't successful with the first part, although that wasn't the case with the secons as he quickly spotted one of the twins standing near the counter, not very crowded that day, waiting for his drinks.

"Oh, hey there… er, Fred?" he greeted in return as he approached the pub's counter, a bit uncertain of which of the two identical redheads he was talking to. This one, he noted, seemed to have some of the ends of his hair a bit charred – the result of an explosion, Sirius imagined.

"George, actually," he corrected without a fuss. "Didn't expect to see you here at this hour. The place is pretty deserted. People are still freaked out because of the breakout, I guess. Huddled at home and everything," he said as the landlord of the pub, Tom, placed four butterbeers on the counter for him.

"Merlin, you and Fred are in a drinking mood today," Sirius had to observe.

George snorted. "Those are not just for the two of us, actually. Angelina and a friend of hers are over there," he said, gesturing to a corner booth where Sirius quickly spotted Fred and his girlfriend sitting with a perky blonde girl who seemed to be giving them quite a speech. "Just call it our 'half-blind double date'." He made a gagging sound at that.

"A half-blind double date?" Sirius asked, intrigued.

"Long story short, Angie thinks I need a girl so she's trying to fix me up with her friend – Anna or Audrey or Alicia… something starting with an A, I'm sure – by arranging for us to take part on a double date with her and Fred," he lamely explained.

"Not going well?"

George huffed. "She just won't _shut up_. Merlin, I wonder how she manages to even breathe! When she went to the bathroom, our ears sighed in relief – Angie swears she's not this much of a chatterbox at work. For the record, you're my witness that she and Fred owe me. Badly."

"Well, didn't you create your Skiving Snackbox products for situations similar to this one? Take some Fever Fudge or something and you'll have the perfect excuse to leave. And don't tell me you don't always have some of those at hand," Sirius pointed out. "Any respectable prankster always has some of his most useful tools at hand."

The redhead looked at him, impressed. "That's not such a bad idea," he admitted, searching his pockets for the products in question. He ended up coming up with what seemed to be a square piece of confectionary covered with bright red wrapper. "Nosebleed Nougat. This should do the job." He tucked it back into his pocket with a plotting grin on his face. "Thanks for the advice. You've just saved me from endless hours of boredom."

"Don't mention it – us pranksters need to stick together," Sirius said dismissively.

"Very true," George admitted. "And speaking of pranksters and, by extension, Marauders, I hope you have a whole lot of cheering planned for Moony. The bloke looks like someone just ate his puppy. Honestly, he's got to come to work tomorrow and it's bad for the business having an employee with a long face even if he doesn't show it much to costumers."

"Wait, Remus is here?" Sirius looked around again, searching for his friend, only to see himself unable to spot him again. Well, it wasn't like he had the best angle at the moment. Surely there were blind spots in the bar.

"Sure. I saw him entering like fifteen minutes ago looking like the world was about to end. I don't think he saw any of us here – he took a seat at one of the booths upstairs," he said, pointing up at a balcony area over the bar which Sirius knew to contain only a handful of tables. "Doesn't seem he want to be bothered."

"Oh," Sirius mumbled. Truly enough, felt thankful he'd ran into George. If he hadn't taken a moment to stop and chat, odds were he wouldn't have thought of going searching upstairs.

"So, what's wrong with him?" George asked, seriously. "He seemed just fine all day at the shop and at the meeting too – I haven't seen him looking this down since… well, since before we hired him and he and Tonks got together. Did something happen? Are they having a fight?"

"In a way… Honestly, I think you should ask him that directly," Sirius told the boy. "I don't think this… thing is for me to share. No offence."

George shook his head. "None taken. Just tell me – how bad is it?"

That was a good question, Sirius thought. One whose answer would depend on the outcome of their conversation. "Ask me again another time, will you?"

"Hum, that bad," the redhead mumbled. "Well, better take those butterbeers to the table before they get completely flat. Thanks again for the… advice on the whole skiving thing, by the way." And, with that, he walked away, towards the others. It was a few seconds later, as Sirius walked towards the staircase leading upstairs, that some sort of commotion started taking place at the twins' booth, no doubt related to George's staged nosebleed.

Unaffected by the redhead's theatrics, he just kept making his way up. By the time he reached the top, he finally spotted Remus sitting alone, very still, only the back of his head visible to Sirius.

He pursed his lips together, then, feeling himself getting angier. _What the hell were you thinking, Moony? _He thought. How the hell could the most upstanding bloke he knew mess up that bad? With that thought in his mid, Sirius took another breath and walked a few steps further, taking the seat opposite Remus's.

The guy looked in shock and pale as a ghost – the last time he's seen him that way it had been right after a particularly bad full moon. Though that didn't make him any less of a jerk for doing what he'd done to Tonks, it did make Sirius feel a little sympathetic. Just a little. "Well, look at that," he said a tone like poisoned honey. "Moony hanging out in a pub on his own. Haven't you ever heard that drinking alone isn't good for you?" He nodded at the half-full glass of firewhiskey resting on the table between them.

"I'm not in the mood for your joking, Sirius," Remus said in a plain tone.

"Oh, I know. Believe me, I know," he replied, his voice hardening. "Apparently, you're just in the mood for walking out on your wife. Your pregnant wife, let me add."

Remus looked at him in shock. "You know."

"I know," Sirius repeated. "She showed up at my doorstep looking like a wreck. Do you have any idea what you did to her? What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Sirius…"

"You know, there are loads of rules when it comes to relationships. _Loads_," he stated. "But, out of those loads, two are the most important ones: don't hurt the person you love in any way and don't walk out on them. Especially when they need you the most. Especially when they're having _your kid_. So, for Merlin's sake, tell me what got into your head that made you break those two rules at the same time. And if you say it's just that whole 'I'm a werewolf' crap, I swear I'll drag you outside and kick your arse so badly you'll wish it was full moon." He couldn't help himself from being that rough. From not going easy on him. Remus had it coming. It was ludicrous – absolutely ludicrous. He'd give anything, _anything,_ to have been there to celebrate with Mia when she'd found out they were first having a baby, to have witness his daughter being born, to have been there to see her and Harry through their childhood… and yet his own best friend – the only best friend he had left – was so easily giving that up. It made Sirius want to punch his face in.

"I messed up," Remus simply replied, taking a sip of his glass.

"Well, that's a bit of progress," Sirius offered, taken aback by his admission. "Still doesn't answer what possessed you to do it."

"I don't know, Sirius. I…" he paused and sighed. "All my life, I always thought I'd never find someone… someone like her. That I'd always be alone. And I was fine with it. I didn't want to share my burden with anyone…"

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Here we go…"

"Don't be patronizing, Sirius. It's impossible to discuss this without bringing up me being a werewolf," Remus replied. "I've made her an outcast, put her in danger in more ways than I probably imagine… Do you even know what children of werewolves are?"

"No."

"Neither do I. What if the curse passes down? What if some sort of mutation happens? What if…?"

"Do you want to know what I know?" Sirius interrupted. "I know that, this morning, your wife went to St. Mungo's. I know that, when they found out what the 'problem' was, they sent her up to the baby healer department (or whatever it's called) and I know that the healer who took her case happens to be one Elizabeth Harper – you probably know her: was in our year at Hogwarts, spent a lot of time with Mia and Lily, considers you a good friend and is perfectly aware of (and fine with) your furry little problem. She's also a damn great healer and assured Tonks her baby was perfectly alright and perfectly normal, something I'd bet anything she wouldn't have done without running every test possible to make sure of those facts. So, guess what? Your kid so far is not a three headed furry thing or whatever disturbing picture you're imagining at the moment. And if, at some point, it turns out the little one has a furry little problem too, it probably helps having a dad around who knows a thing or two about dealing with it. You had no business walking out on your wife and your kid like that. That's selfish and, honestly, a bit cowardly too."

"Yeah. That's what Harry said," Remus mumbled, looking down at his glass, apparently in some sort of a trance.

Sirius furrowed his brows. "Harry?"

"He sent me a howler."

"He… what?" Sirius asked in disbelief. So the ash he'd found _had _been from a howler. Merlin's pants, he thought. "So, let me get this straight: _Harry_ sent you a howler?"

"He did…"

He couldn't help chuckling. "Blimey, that kid's brilliant. But how… I told him like half an hour ago. How could an owl have reached you so fast?"

"My guess is he didn't send one. He sent Kreacher. I heard that cracking sound house elves do when they apparated and then the envelope was just there," Remus explained in a detached tone.

"Twice as brilliant, then," Sirius mumbled, impressed. "So, what did he say?"

"What you said. That I had no business walking out on Tonks and my child. That he didn't care what reason I might have for that, nothing could make it right – allowing another child to grow up without a father. And that he couldn't believe one of his father's best friends, one of the best teachers he'd ever head could be such a… such a coward." He paused, then and Sirius didn't say a word, either. Just waited. "I swear it was just like hearing James saying it," Remus confessed several seconds later. "It just made it all worse, you know? James died to save his child and I'm walking out on mine."

"You're figuring it all out now, aren't you, Moony?" Sirius asked calmly. "That's your kid Tonks is carrying. It will need you just as it will need her and, Merlin, Moony, you'll regret it for the rest of your life if you push yourself out of his or her life. And, trust me, that's not a feeling you want to live with. You owe it to your kid to be part of its life and you owe it to Tonks to be there to help her through the whole way. She's made you happier than I've ever seen you since we were kids – you can't do this to her."

"I know. Trust me, I've realized that even before I came here, Sirius. Or rather I came here _because_ I realized that," Remus declared. "I know I messed up really bad and I would undo and unsay everything but I can't. Dora will never forgive me."

His best friend sighed. "You'd be surprised with the amount of stuff the people who care for you can forgive. Look at us: I nearly had you ripping Snape to pieces in out fifth year because of some stupid, poorly-planned prank and you forgave me for putting you in that position when many people wouldn't. Listen, do you even know why Tonks came to us tonight? After you left?"

He shook his head. "Because she needed someone to be there for her?" Remus said, feeling his throat ache with regret.

Sirius shook his head. "She could have gone to her parents if she wanted to be coddled, Moony. The reason why she came to Mia and I instead of them is because she knows that, aside from her, we are the ones who know you best. And she knew I was the person most likely to find you after some moody storming out session. I won't lie: she'll be pissed at you – she has more than a good reason to. But she wants you back. So get your head out of your arse, Moony, and go make it all better for her. Apologize on your knees if you have to – just do whatever you need to let her know that your idiocy was completely temporary. That you are never, _ever_ doing something like this again. Because if you're planning to walk out again, just do us all a favour and don't bother to go back this time."

"I'm not walking away again. I'm not," Remus told him more confidently than Sirius had ever heard him. "Only if there's no other way. Absolutely none."

Sirius couldn't counter that – if his family's survival depended on him leaving, he'd do just that without regret. He'd do anything for them. "I suppose those are acceptable terms – just one thing, though. If that situation comes: you having to leave because there's no other way… let Tonks help you judge that. You know, because you tend to be a bit… over-dramatic in this 'I'm the problem' thing."

Remus sighed and his eyes shifted to the half-full glass of firewhiskey again. "You know, part of me feels selfish for wanting to go back to her. For all of this…There are so many ways in which she and that child would be better off without me around…"

_Oh, come on! _Sirius thought. "What they would be better off without are your stupid dramas," he told his friend moodily. "Go get your head checked for memory loss, mate – we've been through this _dozens _of times. Let her decide what's she's better off with or without. You're her husband, not her keeper. Act like it," he said sternly.

There wasn't a thing Remus could say against that. His friend was right – when had Sirius become the wise one? "So, she's at Grimmauld Place?" he asked, finally.

Sirius nodded, motioning to stand up, indicating it was time for them to go. "Mia's decided to have her spending the night over – we weren't sure how hard you'd be to push some sense into. In any case, don't count on her to going back home with you tonight – I'd say it's very likely you'll be walking on eggshells for a while. Keep in mind those break very easily so you'd better give her some space."

Remus nodded. "I intend to," he said, getting up.

His friend nodded in return. "Now, speaking of things that break easily…" he started, narrowing his eyes at Remus and leaving the sentence to be finished by his fist punching him right on the face. He'd been wishing to do that ever since he's seen Tonks crying brokenly at their entrance hall. Still, he couldn't help immediately regretting not hexing him instead, as his hand felt like it had just crashed against a bloody brick wall. Merlin, he hoped it wasn't broken or Mia would kill him.

"Damn it, Sirius, I thought we had this settled!" Remus said in shock, rubbing his chin in a way that let him know it was aching way less than his hand was. Damn werewolves had to be so bloody hard to punch.

Sirius hissed out a pretty heavy curse as he flexed his hand tentatively. "I promised your wife I'd _beat_ some sense into you – I take my promises very literally. Also, in my book there's one thing that no one, not even my best friend, gets to mess around with – that's family. The good kind of family, I mean, either it's mine or it's yours. In this case, by messing with Tonks, you messed with both. So, consider the punch a warning for future reference."

Remus just looked at him for a few seconds, registering his words carefully. "Alright, so I had that one coming," he admitted. "Though it would have been a better idea to curse me – that punch probably hurt you more than it hurt me."

"Oh, you think?" Sirius asked sarcastically. "Let's just go now before I feel like doing it again and end up breaking my hand. If it's not already broken, that is."

The other man didn't respond and simply followed Sirius towards the stairs. Several heads turned to them when they reached the ground floor, having heard the commotion upstairs. From a corner booth, Fred gave him an inquisitive look as he sat with his arm around his girlfriend's shoulders. He supposed he should take some time to explain everything to them in the following day – if he owed an explanation to anyone about anything, it was to Fred and George Weasley who'd given him the first job on which he'd lasted for more than a few months at a time, ignoring the many setbacks of having a werewolf as an employee either coming from the law or from the condition itself.

"Oi, step back into the real world, would you?" he heard Sirius's voice say as the two of them stepped out. "We need to apparate and I'd rather give you back to Tonks with all parts attached."

"I can't say I fancy the idea of splinching myself either," Remus said. "But wait."

"What now?" Sirius asked impatiently. "I swear, if you tell me you've changed your mind…"

"I didn't," he assured his friend. "But are you sure it's wise for me to just go back right now? Maybe I should give her more ti…"

Sirius shook his head. "She needs to see you're back. Let her decide from there if she needs time on her own. Merlin, just put yourself together – _you _need more time, just say it."

"I don't."

"Then quit stalling. You've got a wife and a kid to get back to."

And, with that, the matter was settled – or as settled as it could be at the moment – and they apparated straight onto Grimmauld Place's front steps, barely managing not to stumble onto the floor.

"Ready?" Sirius asked, reaching for the door's lock with his wand.

"Does it matter?"

Sirius shrugged in response and tapped the lock, opening it.

The entrance hall was dark and empty like a grave but not for long. As Sirius used his wand to lit the nearest chandelier, Harry, who apparently had been secretly lurking up on the first floor waiting for them to arrive, quickly walked down the stairs and answered the silent question.

"Aunt Mia took her upstairs to the room in front of the nursery. They finished talking a few minutes ago – I heard aunt Mia going into Alex's room," he declared plainly, reaching the ground floor.

"Hadn't I told you to go to bed before I left, kid?" Sirius pointed out casually.

Harry shrugged as he moved towards the stairs leading down to the kitchen. "I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just going to the kitchen for a drink of water."

"Well, why don't I join you downstairs then?" Sirius said, turning to Remus. "Go on."

He gulped and nodded before turning to the youngest boy. "Harry…" Remus started, his tone apologetic.

Harry beat him to it. "I was wrong. You're not a coward. But you sure were acting like one," he replied before making his way down the stairs without another word.

"Well, that pretty much says it," Sirius observed. "You know where to find us, Moony." And so he followed Harry. Vaguely, in the background Remus heard Sirius's voice as he spoke to Harry. "_So, a howler?"_

It was up to him now, Remus thought as he climbed heavily up the stairs. Not to screw up further. To put his fears and his issues behind him and do the right thing. The thing he wanted done but that part of him incessantly screamed to be the selfish one to do. He'd always been one full of doubts, of conflicting feelings. Being happy or doing what his self-sacrificing self said to be the right thing? He liked to believe that was what made him different from the others like him. People such as Greyback.

This time, it had all hit him at the same time – the fear of what that child might mean, the fear of being a parent as well, that guilt he'd been carrying since the day he'd given in to Tonks's advances and made her into an outcast… In the midst of his panic, walking out had seemed like the only thing to do, either it was just a temporary situation for him to let himself think on his own or a more permanent arrangement – he wasn't sure which case would have ended up making it without the intervention of Harry's rough words. Still, he knew that, for a moment there, by some sort of twisted logic it had seemed like the right thing to do: leaving and making it all better… getting himself out of the equation. And did knowing that kill him…

He could only thank Merlin that that moment had passed nearly as quickly as it had come. He'd never be able to repay Harry for his piece of sixteen-year-old wisdom that had finally shamed him into seeing how wrong he'd been on walking out. Or Sirius for not going easy on him either and showing him that he still had a shot at correcting his mistakes.

Stepping out of his thoughts, Remus saw himself standing in front of the room Harry had indicated to be the one harbouring Tonks. The door was firmly closed and, for a moment, he wondered if that was a hint for him to leave his wife alone. If it was, he ignored it – it had taken him too long to figure himself out to back away so easily.

So, lifting his hand, he knocked quietly on the wooden door. Seconds passed and there was no answer, so he knocked again. He could hear someone moving inside, which told him she wasn't asleep or anything. "Hum, Dora?" he asked tentatively.

The movements inside became louder and he heard the door clocking seconds later, right before it opened. She looked dreadful, her eyes red and swollen like she'd been crying for a while but not anymore, contrasting with the paleness of her skin. Was she feeling ill again? Was it the pregnancy-related sickness again? Had she even eaten anything? She was supposed to be eating for two now! He stopped himself for a second, amazed at how easily the concerns for her and their unborn child's well-being affected him. He actually had to make an enormous effort not to scoop her up, take her to the bed he could see right behind her and make her remain there until she presented a better colour.

She just looked at him for several seconds and he simply couldn't tell what she was thinking. At some point, she just bit her lip, took a breath and made an effort to look completely indifferent about his presence.

"Oh, good," she started, forcing a monotonous tone into her voice. "You're back. Well, good night." And then, to her husband's surprise, she unceremoniously slammed the door closed right on his face without another word.

As Remus just stood there, looking at the door with a frown on his face, Mia, who'd been standing at Alex's door long enough to have witness the scene, approached him with her arms crossed and a slightly merciless smile on her face. "Well, you had that one coming, hadn't you, Remus?" she said, behind him.

He turned around immediately. "Mia…"

"You know, I usually go easy on you about pretty much everything because you're one of the most responsible and dependable guys I know, not to mention a great friend. But this time… what were you thinking, Remus? Walking out on Tonks? She's your wife. She's having your baby!"

"I know, Mia. I made a horrible mistake and I would do anything to go back in time and erase all of it but that's just not possible," he told her helplessly. "I love her. And it kills me to know that I did this to her… that I upset her this way."

Mia sighed, shaking her head. "What are we going to do with you, Remus Lupin?" she asked.

He didn't respond, suspecting it was just a rhetorical question.

Sighing once more, Mia spoke. "Well, you'd better get ready to start working on gaining her favour back," she told him. "She's hurt. She's really hurt. And she's scared too – knowing you've got an actual… person growing inside of you… it's pretty terrifying at first. Especially if you're alone. And, for a while today, she had to wonder if she'd be alone. You came back – that's a good start. But you need to make sure she doesn't have to wonder about that ever again."

"I will," he promised with a sigh. "Should I…?" he nodded at the closed door of the room he knew his wife to be in.

Mia shook her head. "Not yet. Give her a little time to… well, settle down. Just wait until the morning comes before trying to talk to her again. Or wait for her to come to you. Baby steps, Remus. In the meanwhile, there are plenty of rooms in this house in which you're welcome to stay tonight but, to be honest, taking the living room sofa will probably give you more sympathy in the morning. And, if I were you, I'd go for sympathy. Maybe that's just me."

Remus took a breath. "The sofa it is," he agreed.

"Wise choice," Mia told him, letting out a huff and resting her hand on his arm in a comforting fashion. "For all that's worth, I always imagined you'd make a good father."

"How can you possibly know that?" he asked in return.

"Well, it happens that I know for a fact that you've spent most of your early life keeping your best friends out of major trouble, not to mention that these days you do it in a regular basis for the twins," Mia observed.

"I don't think raising a child is quite the same…"

"It isn't," Mia admitted. "But it's a beginning – you can't deny that. Now, speaking of children, where's that big kid I married? I assume he came back with you."

Remus nodded. "He's with Harry in the kitchen."

Mia raised an eyebrow. "Harry's still awake?"

"He just needed a drink of water, apparently," he pointed out. "You raised s good boy, Mia. I owe him."

She looked at him in confusion. "About what?"

"Long story," he excused himself. "You might want to take a look at Sirius's hand, by the way. I think he hurt it when he punched me."

That only caused Mia's eyebrows to rise further up. "Is that right?" she mumbled, shaking her head. "Merlin, that man…" She shook her head some more. "I'll send Kreacher down to the living room with some pillows and blankets. Try to sleep tonight – people tend to over-think things at night and over-thinking never leads to anything good. And remember: baby steps."

"Baby steps," he repeated as his friend made her way down the stairs. Alone, he turned to face his wife's door, wishing things weren't the way they were.

He'd made his bed, now he had to lie in it and hope for the best.

**A/N2: Hello, everyone! I hope you all liked the chapter - I very much liked to write it :D And, also, I have good news. Expect very soon (maybe today) to find in my profile a little new entry consisting of an out-take parallel to this chapter and the previous, featuring Remus and Tonks. Because so many things happen at the same time and not all of them fit in the main plotlines of Brave New Hope, I decided that this would be the best way to give you a little peak into some of my secondary characters' (punctually also the main ones) lives. That said, from time to time, some out-takes may make an appearance :D So, look into my profile for_ 'Outtakes: The Companion to the Brave New... Series'_. I hope you find this little experience as interesting as I did :D.**

**Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	41. Understanding

**A/N: Sorry for the**** very late update, guys. My family and I spent a few days at a ski resort and, while I was absolutely sure there would be any sort of wireless internet there and had planned to proof-read and post while I was there… there wasn't Internet at all! *Panic, terror, horror-film-music in the background* So, finally back home with my blessed internet back, I give you the newest chapter. It's mostly just a follow-up to the last. Hope you all had a nice Pancake Day!**

"So, this is a bit… awkward," Sirius mumbling, sitting at the centre of his kitchen's table, exactly halfway between Remus and Tonks as all three of them remained all alone in the room.

He had to admit it had been his idea to serve as… well, a mediator for Remus and Tonks's first meeting in the morning after his best friend had made the very asinine decision of leaving his pregnant wife… and, well, the more thoughtful one of coming back. Mia had been quick to point out that she'd rather change a hundred diapers in twenty minutes than joining him down there for said mediation and, honestly, at the moment he couldn't blame her for it in the slightness.

He'd expected yelling. He'd expected crying. He'd even expected cutlery being projected through the air. What he hadn't expected, though, was silence. Painfully awkward silence.

"What's awkward, Sirius?" Tonks asked him calmly, her face hidden behind that morning's edition of the Daily Prophet, which she seemed to be using as a barrier between herself and her husband, sitting at the opposite end of the long table.

"Oh, I don't know, the fact that we can practically cut the air in this room with a knife because it's so bloody thick with tension," Sirius let her know.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," she replied in the same tone as before. "Why would there be any tension in the room when it's just _you and me_ in it?"

He huffed and back against the back of his chair, closing his eyes for a second, exasperated. There was also the fact that, ever since she'd walked into that kitchen and seen Remus sitting at the table with him (not so subtly waiting for her to show up), she'd stubbornly refused to acknowledge her husband's presence at all. "Silent treatment," Sirius mumbled under his breath. "And they say I'm the one who frequently acts like a kid…"

Tonks finally lowered the newspaper but clearly averted looking at her husband at all, concentrating her glaring on Sirius. "What was that?"

He gulped. "I said you should eat a bit more to feed the kid," he quickly said, pushing a plate of food that had been resting on the centre of the table towards her. "Toast?"

She gave him a dubious look for a moment before just shrugging and turning her attention back to the newspaper – yet not before fetching a piece of toast from the plate and taking a theatrical bite out of it. That time, right before she hid her face back behind the newspaper, her eyes met her husband's just for a short, ice-cold moment.

Seconds later, certain that Tonks wasn't watching them, Sirius gave his best friend a look of disbelief. _What are you doing?_ He mouthed.

Remus simply sighed and poked his eggs with a fork.

Rolling his eyes, Sirius pushed back his chair and got up, making his way to another chair right by Remus's side, preceding to lecture him once more. "Merlin, Moony, can you be any more pitiful? What are you doing, just sitting there not saying anything?" he whispered.

"I'm giving her space – you told me she'd need space," the werewolf replied in the same low tone.

"Not a blood Quidditch field's worth of it!"

"Then what do you suggest I do, Sirius?"

"Show her you care!"

"I have!" he told him, almost cluelessly. "I've come back, haven't I?"

"Yeah. And that's a bloody great start if you bother to tell her why. Right now, as far as she knows, you may have just come back because I threatened to beat you into a bloody pulp if you didn't. So show her that's not the case. And, for Merlin's sake, show her you care for your kid because, as far as I know, you didn't do a very good job with it last night."

Remus took a deep breath and glanced his wife's newspaper-covered face – he wondered what she was thinking. She was usually rather easy to read in what came to emotions, so he suspected the newspaper's purpose was exactly to keep him from doing so. "I wish I could turn back time, Padfoot."

"Yeah and I wish I had You-Know-Who standing here in front of me and a weapon that would kill him in a blink of a eye just so I could end his miserable life and keep my family safe," Sirius countered. "Doesn't work like that, Moony. If you want something to become true, get it done yourself. You know Tonks, you love her and you're damn well smart enough to figure out how to make this right, so get it done once and for all." And, as he finished that, Sirius got up again and returned to his previous seat.

He sat there, waiting. Remus gave him a look that clearly showed how unsure he was and Sirius responded with an urging nod towards his cousin. On his seat, his friend took another deep breath and finally spoke.

"Dora," he started.

Sirius saw Tonks visibly flinch at the mention of the nickname only her husband and her parents used on her, yet she didn't seem to be interested in offering any sign of him having her attention.

"Dora…"

"Sirius, can you please tell that other _person _sitting opposite me that I'm not interested in what he has to say now?" Tonks said from behind the newspaper wall, still refusing to acknowledge her husband directly.

Frustrated, Sirius huffed and turned to his friend. "She says she's not interested."

Remus raised his eyebrows. "Merlin, Dora, are you honestly planning to give me silent treatment forever?"

Tonks lowered her newspaper just a little and turned to her cousin. "If you could just point out that at least _my _silent treatment doesn't involve me storming out to Merlin knew where…"

Sirius couldn't help letting out another huff at. "Moony…"

"I heard it," Remus interrupted him. "You have a right to be angry Dora. Merlin, _I _am angry at myself…"

"Sirius, please tell him…"

"Merlin, this is basically hell on earth," Sirius mumbled to himself in annoyance as Tonks kept dictating the message for him to pass. Deciding that it was up to him to end that pitiful show, he cleared his throat loudly in order to get his attention. "Okay, will you two do yourselves and my sanity a favour and just get on the same page here? First one wants to talk and the other's gone. Then the other one wants to talk after all and the first is giving him a cold shoulder… am I the only one getting the stupidity in all this?"

A long moment of silence from either side followed his words, as none seemed to want to be the first to say… well, anything. In all honesty, Sirius got why Tonks didn't want to talk. She'd been terrified in the previous night: too terrified to be angry. But then Remus had come back and she hadn't been so terrified anymore – just angry that he'd left in the first place. And, blimey, no one in their right mind could blame her for it – still, silence wouldn't lead anywhere, as easy as it might be.

Just when it seemed like Remus was going to say something, taking the first step into an actual conversation, voices and steps came from the stairway right outside the kitchen, interrupting him. "_…yes, I'll give you one of the chocolate ones. Just don't tell Mom, okay?"_ Izzy's voice was saying.

"'_Kay. Don't tell Mama. An' Daddy?_" another voice, clearly Alex's, asked her just as he walked into the kitchen, the little boy's hand firmly connected to his older sister's.

Izzy stopped when she saw all three down there, looking a bit embarrassed. "Oh, sorry. Mom said you were downstairs but I thought she meant the living room or something. We'll just…"

Alex beat her, though, as he suddenly let go of her hand and ran happily towards Tonks. "Antie Tonksh! Wanna see funny faces," he announced, climbing onto a chair near hers.

Despite the tension still floating all over the room, Tonks couldn't help smiling at her husband's godson. "My morphing has been a bit under the weather lately, little bugger."

He frowned, not at her words because he only understood half of them, but at her now brown-coloured hair. He pointed at it in a clearly disapproving fashion. "Bah. Whew colouws?"

She sighed, missing her favourite tone of pink, and ruffled his own hair lightly. "Demanding, aren't you, little guy?"

"Puple!" he requested.

She chuckled lightly and reached for the boy, pulling him into her lap. "Alright. I suppose I can give 'puple' a try."

"Er… Dora, are you sure that's safe?" she heard her husband's familiar voice asking before she had a chance to try and morph. She looked at him with narrowed eyes and shot him a full blown glare. "Alex being on your lap with… you know, the baby and everything…"

"Oh, look at that. _Now _he cares," she bitterly responded.

"I'm just saying," Remus replied, immediately retreating.

"Well, maybe you should have said it last night when I really needed to hear it!" she replied angrily, causing Alex to grow uncomfortable and quickly making an escape from her lap straight to his father's legs, who'd approached as she remained at the door, looking at both halves of the couple, confused.

"Tonks is pregnant?" she whispered to her father in surprise.

He nodded as he picked up his son from the floor and bribed him with one of the chocolate cookies from the jar on the nearby counter. "Your Mom didn't tell you?" he whispered back, receiving a headshake in return. "Must have thought Harry already had… And in case you're wondering what the fight is about, I think I'll just refer you to Harry because I really, really don't feel like telling the story all over again," he excused himself quickly as he felt the tempers rising between Remus and Tonks the room. "You know what? It might be a good idea for you to take your brother upstairs for now before the cursing starts and your mum blames the swearing he picks up on me."

"Because we all know it never is your fault," Izzy commented sarcastically, already feeling the tension as she picked up little Alex from her father's lap. "You might want to step outside too – I'd say very soon you'll be one too many in this room."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, confused.

"This isn't your fight, Daddy – and when it comes to, well, couple fights, whatever it is about, if it's not related to you it's best to walk away and watch from afar unless you want to get hit by the shockwaves. Trust me – Harry, Ginny and I have learned this after many bad experiences concerning Ron and Hermione's tiffs. And note that they're not even dating or anything." And with her piece of wisdom shared, Izzy reached for her little brother and removed him from her father's hold before walking out of the kitchen with him.

With his son and daughter out of sight, Sirius turned to face the table in order to check on the now-arguing couple – in a mostly one-sided sort of way – and was rather taken aback by the scene. When had Tonks's hair gotten so red? Could it be somehow channelling her fury? If that was the case, an explosion was coming. A big one. Bigger even if she'd inherited the Black temper, which, if he recalled it well, was a trait Andromeda surely hadn't skipped, although she was far more controlled at it than any or her sisters. He wasn't sure just how scared he should be at that fact. One thing was for sure: suddenly watching from afar didn't seem like such a bad idea.

So, following his daughter's advice, he silently backed away from the room, unnoticed to either Remus or Tonks, and took a seat halfway up the stairs to the ground floor, from where he could still hear their voices well enough.

"_Dora, I can't even begin to apologize…_" he clearly heard Remus saying at some point.

"_Then _don't_! Do you have any idea what it felt like being home all alone waiting for you to come back? Or even wondering if you would in the first place? I thought I'd go mad!_"

"_I know I'm so…" _he clearly stopped himself there and used another angle. Explaining. _"It got me petrified, Dora. Knowing I was having a child… what it meant, what it might turn into…"_

"_What it might turn into?" _she asked in disbelief. _"You mean a werewolf? Is that what it's all about?"_

"_You can't deny there's a possibility, Dora_," he stated. "_I thought… for a moment I thought that I not being around would spare you of another problem."_

There was a pause of several seconds before she spoke. "_What in the world _possessed_ you to think I'd be better off raising a werewolf child on my own instead of with someone who actually knows a handful of things about it? What sort of… twisted logic led you to such a _stupid_ idea, you bloody idiot? Because, from where I stand, that logic you used to justify walking out on me and this baby – werewolf, human, blast-ended skrewt for all I care because I already love it anyway! – is exactly the same one that's been causing people to look sideways at you because of what you are. That's been screwing you over for decades. And I'll be damned if I let you be the one to first discriminate my baby for what he may or may not be. Remus."_

"_It's not like that, Dora. Merlin, it's not like that at all – I wasn't punishing you or this baby," _he assured her._ "But the thought that I might have cursed another child to live the life I'd lived…" _He paused and sighed. "_It terrified me._ _I couldn't deal with that. It was too much at that time, Dora. I just couldn't deal with it and with you there… it just made it harder to deal with."_

"_So you left," _she concluded.

"_So I left,"_ he agreed.

No sound reached Sirius's ears again for another ten or twenty seconds. "_Haven't you even considered that I'm scared too? Maybe not for the exact same reasons but still terrified to the bone? I'm having a kid, Remus! And I haven't the palest idea of how to be a parent! A mum. I don't even know where to start and I ask myself all these questions: How will this baby turn out? What if I'll mess it up for life? So, look at that, you're not the only one scared out of his mind! The only difference between you and I, though, is that if I get freaked out, I can't possibly walk out because – guess what? – I'm the one who's carrying this baby so it will follow me wherever I go. And this is not me saying I want to walk out – because I don't. My point is that, out of the two of us, you're the one with the easy way out. And it just kills me that you used it last night_," Sirius heard her telling Remus, her tone more towards the heartbroken side than to the angry one.

As the conversation went on in the kitchen, Sirius heard the sound of steps upstairs and wondered if someone was coming. Just in case, he used his wand to cast a one-sided imperturbable charm on the kitchen door so his presence or anyone's outside of the kitchen wouldn't be felt in it – he honestly didn't want to interrupt the conversation taking place at the kitchen which seemed to be on the rightest of paths. The one that would hopefully lead the couple to an understanding.

Things down there got worse before they got better. More accusations and even a bit of yelling from Tonks's part and many half-apologies from Remus's. His wife seemed to be quite keen in what came to not letting him finish his apologies – somehow, Sirius had a feeling that it was because she knew she wouldn't be able to remain pissed off at her husband much longer after a heartfelt apology from his part…

The sound of steps upstairs reached his ears again louder and louder and, even before he had a chance to glance up to see who was approaching, he heard his wife's voice behind him. "You know, Sirius, eavesdropping is quite a rude thing to do. I'm sure you're fairly aware of that."

He looked up and offered Mia an innocent grin as he saw her standing a few steps above him holding their youngest daughter on her hip. "Me? Of course not – I'm afraid parenting in this house before you came around mostly consisted of trying to make your children evil, blood-prejudiced, muggle-hating individuals. Good manners aside from that were fairly neglected in my early upbringing."

Mia sighed. She couldn't deny that maybe he wasn't all that distant from the truth – the pure thought made her cringe. How close had Sirius been to turning into one of those awful people like the rest of his family? "Well, early upbringing or not, you're smart enough to know when you're being a bad bay, Mr Black," she scolded.

His grin widened. "Why, I love it when you call me that, Mrs. Black. It does make me want to be one indeed," he teased playfully, making her roll her eyes. "Still, I can assure you that the only reason I'm sitting here…" he made quoting signals with his hands before continuing "…'eavesdropping' is strictly to make sure I'm ready in case Tonks decides to go on a rampage and curses Moony with some permanent damaging spell or something," Sirius assured her as she walked further down the stairs and sat down by his side, holding little Mary firmly in her arms. The little girl's cheeks were still a bit red from slumber, although she was already dressed for the day.

"Oh, so because this evestropping is for a good cause, it makes it all better," Mia said, unconvinced.

"Of course," he replied, picking up his daughter from her mother's arms, sitting her on his lap and kissing the top of her head over all that soft, baby-smelling, light brown hair. "Daddy's just looking out for your godparents," he informed Mary on his best-sounding baby tone. "Did Mommy tell you that you're getting a god-sibling?" he asked the baby before frowning slightly at his own words and turning to Mia. "Is that a real word? God-sibling?"

Mia shrugged. "I doubt it. Izzy and Harry used it a lot when they were kids, though, to describe each other – they thought it was funny. But, anyway, I suppose that, because this is such a complicated family, we can make up our own relative categories to simplify the whole thing."

"Yes, telling Mary here that Moony's kid will be her god-sibling or whatever sounds much easier than telling her it will be her…" he paused for a second, doing the math in his head "… second cousin once removed. Yeah, I think that's it," Sirius concluded, turning to his little daughter. "Can you say '_uncle Moony and auntie Tonks's baby will be my second cousin once removed_'?"

The little girl let out a loud giggle and tried to reach for his nose in response.

Sirius gave her his index finger to grasp instead – long gone was the time when she could barely close her tiny little hand around it. Merlin, his little girl she getting big and Moony was getting a baby of his own… When had _that_ happened? "Alright, I'll take that as a 'maybe later', shall I, young lady?" He turned to Mia only to see her smiling at his interaction with their youngest child. "Try not to think less of her for passing up this speaking opportunity – it's quite a mouthful."

"Oh, I don't know, Sirius. A not yet seven-month-old baby being unable to say a thirteen-word sentence? Maybe we should start worrying," Mia said in a mock-serious tone.

"Aw, look at that, little girl," he told his daughter. "Mommy's mocking you." He gave Mia a fake look of disapproval.

Mia rolled her eyes and reached to tickle her daughter's belly, making her squeal in delight. "Mommy's not. She's just mocking your barmy Daddy who thinks you're an impossibly large prodigy."

"Oh, how dare you? Of course my little girl is a prodigy with all the good genes she got from us," Sirius replied, trying to sound offended.

"From my side, maybe," she joked. "I mean, your family history speaks for itself – consanguine marriages usually don't lead to anything good and, if I recall it well, your parents were cousins, weren't they?"

"Hey! Is it complaining I hear? Because I like to believe I've turned out just fine despite the slightly odd fact that I happen to be my own second cousin," Sirius stated. "Interesting, hum?"

"In a very disturbing sort of way," Mia replied, fighting hard not to show him a completely creeped out facial expression. "Anyway, I'm not complaining per se. Sometimes I just wonder what it would have been like to have married a version of yourself without consanguinity involved," she lied just to push his buttons. "I'm pretty sure Alex's vocabulary wouldn't be so full of profanity if that was the case."

"Oh, is that right? Well, odds are that version of myself would have been smart enough not to end up with such a minx of a wife," he countered, beating her at her own game.

Mia narrowed her eyes. "That was low."

"You set the rules, love. I'm just following them," Sirius informed her victoriously before reaching to place a soft kiss on her lips. "Now, what about a truce?"

"I suppose I could live with one of those. We wouldn't want Mary to think we get a kick out of teasing each other," his wife pointed out.

"Phew, of course not. Teasing Mommy's a bummer," he said, shifting his daughter's position so he was holding her under her arms and trying to get her to stand up on his lap. Mary seemed to approve of that, bouncing happily on her father's lap. "That's my girl," he told her with a grin as his daughter tried to reach for his face with her little arms, her hands only a quarter of inch away from it.

"How long have they been this quiet?" Mia asked suddenly.

"Who?" Sirius inquired, all his attention concentrated on making silly faces to Mary.

"Remus and Tonks," she replied. "I can barely hear them now. Do you figure they heard us here and went away to talk somewhere else?"

He didn't say a thing for a second, just then realizing how much Mia's presence had distracted him from the conversation between Remus and Tonks. "No. I distinctively recall placing a one-way imperturbable charm on the kitchen door. We could hear them but they couldn't hear us," Sirius assured her, sitting the baby back down on his lap. "You don't think…"

"Don't think what?"

"You don't think Tonks just stunned him, used the floo to go away and just left him down there to rot, do you?"

Mia didn't respond immediately, considering the scenario. "Of course not. She wouldn't."

Sirius remained silent for a few seconds as well before speaking again. "Maybe we could check just in case."

Despite her earlier words expressing her faith on Tonks, his wife was already ahead of him there, picking their daughter up from his lap to allow him to stand up. They descended the stairs in a hurry, not bothering to be quiet since Sirius's spell kept them from being heard in the kitchen, and reached the bottom in no time. Sirius was the first to peak into the kitchen only to see neither Remus nor Tonks seemed to be at the table anymore.

_Not good, _he thought, instinctively scanning the floor for any sign of his friend being there, passed out. Yet, he quickly realized how wrong he was – as he took a careful step further into the room, the couple came into his view, standing near the unlit fireplace. Not just standing, he noted – they were rather wrapped around each other, in fact, kissing as if nothing else in the world mattered.

He couldn't help raising his eyebrows at that and biting his lower lip to keep himself from laughing out loud. _Well that was fast_, he mumbled in his mind, rather impressed. To think he'd expected his best mate to come out of that confrontation with his arse kicked by his wife – maybe he should give the bloke a little more credit. For a moment, just a moment, he wished he hadn't been so entranced with Mia and Mary before only to have heard how on earth Moony had talked his way out of the mess he'd gotten himself into and, well, into what seemed to be quite a snog… That ought to be an interesting thing to hear.

He turned his head slightly and saw Mia right behind him, peaking over his shoulder on tiptoes and smiling widely – he could practically hear her 'aw'-ing the couple in her head –, as little Mary sucked on her thumb in her mother's arms.

"Maybe we should leave them alone a little longer," Mia whispered into his ear.

"Yeah, maybe," he absently replied just as Remus and Tonks broke apart by the fireplace, completely oblivious to their presence.

Both Sirius and Mia took a step back but couldn't resist remaining still inside the room just to get a visual, as small as it might be, of Remus and Tonks, curious about the current state of affairs between the couple.

Oh her spot, Tonks – her hair now back to a hue somewhere between brown and red – let out a loud sigh and let her face rest against her husband's shoulder in rather tender way. "_You're still a jerk_," her muffled voice said, contrasting with her more tender gesture. "_And you're not off the hook."_

"_Never assumed I would be," _he assured her.

"_Glad to see you're keeping it real,"_ she said. "_You walking out on me and the baby last night… it felt like a nightmare. And I get to be pissed off at you for it a little bit longer. There will be a lot of back rubs, foot rubs and romantic meals before I let this one slide for good._"

The relieved, yet remorseful breath that Remus took after her words was loud enough to be heard at the door. "_I know. And I'm sorry, Dora. I'm so sorry_," he replied – his face was turned away from Sirius and Mia but both could imagine perfectly the almost helpless expression that came along with that tone.

"_Don't_," she mumbled in return, pulling away. "_Don't be sorry – be sure you're never pulling something like this on us again. Because if you do…_" She stopped herself by biting her lower lip, not even able to voice how badly that would break her. Sighing, Tonks looked up at him and gave him a determined look before poking his chest with her index finger in a warning fashion. "_Don't you ever leave me hanging like you did last night again. You have no idea how it felt like to wonder if you'd come back or not, Remus."_

"_I won't… Merlin, Dora, I won't_," they heard him assure her in return.

There was moment of silence, then, during which Tonks just observed her husband thoughtfully, as if she was trying to figure out what the hell she should do with him. Mia could imagine the internal struggle – she'd been like that, she recalled, little more than one year prior: torn between just forgetting everything and simply forgiving the man she loved for a not-so-considerate action that had deeply hurt her or holding on to the pain that it caused her because it was so hard to ignore…

On the spot where she stood, the metamorphagus simply sighed and reached forward to wrap her arms around Remus, though she did so in a slightly guarded way, which confirmed she wasn't quite ready to forgive and forget, yet happy enough to have him back…"_You're an idiot_," she let him know.

Remus's only response at that was a resigned breath, almost like he was saying 'yes, honey', as he hugged her back.

It was right around that moment that, annoyed from not having her parents' attention, little Mary squirmed and let out an annoyed sound, just loud enough for Remus and Tonks to hear her and jump away from each other like they'd just been committing the most horrifying of sins.

"What are you…?" Tonks begun to ask as soon as she saw them.

"Apple mash!" Sirius said suddenly.

Remus looked at him like he was mad. "Have you hit your head, Padfoot? "

He huffed, taking the baby from his wife's arms. "I meant that Mary here needs to eat her apple mash. She gets all cranky without it, isn't that right, little love?" he asked the little girl. Her response mostly consisted of an unintelligible baby sound followed by her smacking both of her little hands softly on his face, a smile the size of the sun on her face. "That means 'yes', in case you're wondering. Maybe you should note it down for when that kid comes around. Learning baby language is quite a feat."

The mention of the baby brought a small smile to Tonks's face and she subtly crossed her arms over her middle. "We'll keep that in mind," she mentioned, her lips curling just a little.

"I'm sorry, we really just needed the room," Mia lied, sounding slightly more believably than her husband. "So, I take it things are on their way to resolution between you too."

Tonks gave Remus a glance, who seemed like a little boy embarrassed by having been caught with his hands inside the cookie jar. "Let's just say we're heading into a probationary period, shall we?" she said, silently asking for his agreement.

"Sounds fine to me," he mumbled in return – it was way more than he'd been expecting in the previous night. He honestly couldn't complain.

Mia smiled. "Well, I'm happy you managed to reach an understanding, then," she declared, taking little Mary from her father's hold. "And now let's go make you your breakfast, shall we, honey?" she told her daughter in a sweet tone as they walked away towards the kitchen counter.

"Well, probation or not, mate, don't forget you're always welcome on our living room sofa," Sirius replied, grinning in a mocking fashion, which won him a glare from Remus. "No, but seriously, you," he said, pointing at Remus, "don't forget what I told you last night: second opinions, mate, just ask for second opinions. And also," he continued, flexing his right hand, still rather red from the previous night's events, and glaring at his friend's completely non-bruised face with just a little bit of resentment over the lack of effectiveness of his punch, "keep my other points in mind."

"Provided they come in less physical ways, for your own sake," Remus mumbled under his breath, causing his wife to give him an inquisitive look which he dismissed with a shake of his head, letting her know she wouldn't want to know what that was about.

Sirius chose to ignore that part, turning his attention to his cousin instead and taking a more responsible approach. "And you, don't even think of leaving to work without finishing your breakfast."

Tonks raised her eyebrows at him "And just who do you think you are? My Mom?"

"No, but I certainly will be your kid's favourite uncle and I'd rather it was born healthy enough to join the many, many Quidditch games I have planned for a not-so-distant future," Sirius pointed out. "Just be a good girl, Tonks. For your baby's sake."

She'd been quite ready to bark back some sort of acid response mostly for the sake of being defiant but the mention of the baby seemed to be enough to keep her from doing so. She was supposed to not only be looking after herself now but also after a human being completely dependent on her… "Fine," she replied moodily, making her way to the kitchen table and fetching the last bit of toast left on her plate, giving it a bite. "There. I'll take this with me. Now," she said, checking her watch, "I have to go because I still need to drop by home already before heading to work since _some of us_ don't have practically a whole summer's worth of vacation."

Sirius snorted and sat down by the table. "Phew, jealousy is such a petty display, isn't it, Moony? Educate your wife a little."

"I think, for my own sake, that I'll stick with taking her side for quite some time, Sirius, so… she's perfectly educated, as far as I can tell," Remus replied cautiously, gaining a look of approval from his wife.

"Alright, then. Alright… So, I'll just… go," Tonks said, just a little awkwardly.

She glanced at her husband and wondered where exactly they stood – she knew she wasn't half as angry at him as she'd been before… she also knew she wasn't completely over the fact that he'd left and put her through hell. So, where did they stand, exactly? She'd called it probation before – maybe that was really the right term… So, how exactly did one handle farewells in what came to their probationary husband? Should she give him a kiss? A hug? A respectful handshake? Was there some sort of code for that? Merlin, just how confusing did it have to be? Plus, there was the fact that both Sirius and Mia were in the room…

Remus saved her from further thinking, though, as he just stood up. "I'll go with you," he announced. "I need to be at the shop soon too. The twins saw me tonight so they're bound to ask their share of questions before the shop opens…"

"Great, so we'll just… go," Tonks said before turning to Sirius. "Is it alright if we use the…?" she gestured towards the fireplace.

"Floo away," Sirius said from the table with a grin.

"Good, then…" she turned to her husband "… can you go first and give me a moment with them?"

He raised his eyebrows at her for a moment, wondering what she had to tell Sirius or Mia that he couldn't hear. Still, he ended up just nodding and making his way to the floo's fireplace – it would be a while before he was able to say 'no' to her…

Tonks waited until he was gone before she turned to Sirius. "Thank you," she said, quickly making his way to him and nearly choking him with likely the tightest hug he'd ever gotten. Blimey, was she strong for her size… "Thank you so much, Sirius."

"Hum, a bit tight here," he managed to say.

"Oh, right," she said, laughing nervously as she pulled away. "Just… thank you."

"What for?" Mia asked as she approached them both with Mary in her arms.

"For… everything. Everything you guys did to help me last night. Thank you," she repeated once more, turning specifically to Sirius again. "You brought him back."

He chuckled. "I believe that was part of the deal we made last night. Plus, I don't think it's me you have to thank – it's mostly Harry and his howler."

"Ah, Remus told me about it," she said, sighing. "I'd go thank him but…" she pointed at her watch "… duty calls. I think I'll owl him a truckload of chocolate frogs later or something." She had to laugh at that – Harry did deserve them. "Still," she said. "You had your part too, Sirius. And Mia as well. You two helped me without asking for anything in return when I needed it the most. I have to think of a way to pay you back."

"Oh, I can help you with that. How do you like the name '_Sirius'_ for a boy?"

"Sirius!" Mia scolded him, laughing.

"See? It's even easy to yell when you're trying to scold the kid," he told his cousin, who seemed slightly amused.

"We'll take it under advisement," she assured him. "Don't keep your hopes up, though."

Sirius huffed. "Well, I had to try or you'd lose all respect for me."

"Anyway," Mia told her, as Mary stretched a little arm towards her godmother's now reddish brown hair. "No, honey, no hair pulling."

Tonks shook her head, though. "It's alright. Can I…?" she asked, reaching for the baby.

"Of course," Mia said immediately passing the baby to her easily. "You're her godmother – you don't even need to ask, you know?"

"I know, it's just…" she said, holding the little girl, who was, as always, quite fascinated with her hair.

"You're still getting used to knowing that, in a few months, you'll have one of your own," Mia guessed, feeling slightly nostalgic.

Tonks had to chuckle. "It's just hard to believe – I've never seen myself as the mothering type, really."

"Hum, that one seems to disagree," Sirius pointed out, nodding at little Mary, perfectly content in her godmother's hold.

"It's a bit different, you know? Babysitting and raising a kid?"

"Hey, don't complain – with those powers of yours, you'll beat any parent at the funny-face making," Sirius joked in reply. "Your kid will have to be in a constant good mood and that's halfway done because, trust me, you don't want to be around a cranky infant. They just sound like little banshees sometimes." He jokingly glared at the baby, recalling the many, many sleepless nights she'd give him and Mia mostly in her earlier weeks. "You do have a good excuse to hand the kid out to Remus whenever it's cranky, though, with this dumb move he pulled yesterday…"

That had Tonks sighing. "He thinks the baby will be a werewolf too," she said, assuming her cousin hadn't heard that part of their conversation.

"He told me so – the guy just worries way too much. And if he's right… well, we'll figure it out."

"Just don't worry about until you really have to," Mia advised her. "It's not good for you. You're having a baby. Remus is around again… Just be happy about it."

As Mary giggled in her arms, Tonks let out a deep breath. "I still feel like I should thank you again and again, you know?"

The other woman shook her head. "Nonsense. In fact, I do think we should be the ones offering to thank you, Tonks."

She raised her eyebrows. "Now I'm confused. Thank me for what?"

"Oh, I don't know…" Sirius said, rolling his eyes. "Maybe over turning a pitifully lonely idiot into a pitifully happy one. It may take a while for him to get used to this baby being a real thing but take my word when I tell you that he's happy. Worried, sure – he's Remus, after all – but happier than I've seen him all my life."

The metamorphagus smiled and sighed. "For a moment there I thought he was never coming back," she confessed.

"He would have," Mia assured her confidently. "He loves you too much to stay away for very long. Trust us – we know Remus: he'd have come to his senses sooner or later, either Harry had sent that howler to him or not. Either Sirius had gone after him or not. Bailing's just not him."

"So, do try not to go too hard on him – not too soft either because he does need a lesson. But in the end of the day, the guy's sorry enough to let you have him eating from your palm if you want him to," Sirius stated.

She let out a breath, then, more frustrated than sad. "Even if I wanted to give him grief over this for all eternity, Remus is one of those people you simply can't stay angry at for very long. When he looks at you with those sad eyes… it's hard to leave him stewing with guilt much longer."

Her cousin grinned and turned to his wife. "Sounds to me like Moony's not the only one pitifully in love in this pair."

"Shut up," Tonks mumbled. "I should go. There," she said, passing Mary back to him, not before kissing her little forehead, "take your kid back."

Sirius chuckled. "Hey, you wouldn't want to babysit her next weekend, would you? And maybe Alex too? Strictly for training purposes, of course – you do need the practice for when that one's born," he told her, gesturing at her still very flat stomach.

Tonks gave him a look of disbelief as she made her way to the fireplace. "Merlin, you're going to milk this all the way for free babysitting services, aren't you?"

"What? I'm just doing you and Moony a favour," he countered, innocently.

She gave him a dubiously before grabbing a handful of floo powder. "I'll think about it. Bye, Mia. Bye, Mary." And then, she was gone in an explosion of green flames.

Taking a long breath, Sirius passed the baby to Mia and sunk back into a chair.

"Tired?" Mia asked him, sitting on his lap after she settled little Mary on her feeding chair and placing a soft kiss on his lips.

"Hum, hum," he replied with his eyes closed, nodding.

"Well, I'm sure it's worth it. Not yet ten in the morning and you've already made your good deed of the day by helping Remus and Tonks reaching an understanding. How does it feel like?" she asked him.

He groaned. "Not sure…" Sirius mumbled, opening his eyes and pulling her closer, just so her head was resting on his shoulder. "Promise me one thing, thought."

"What is it?"

"Promise me that you'll remind me in the future to never, _ever _consider making a career out of couple's therapy."

Her reply came in the form of laughter.

**A/N2: Hope you liked the chapter - it ended up really long... again. I'm working on another outtake, though it won't fit into the story for another few chapters... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	42. Two Days, One Note

**A/N: For all those wonderful readers who've sent me messages wondering where I was and why the chapter was take so long (and all other readers too) - Sorry! I'm so sorry it me so long but I've been so, so busy - my life now is basically studying, going to classes, working and having driving lessons (Exam is coming up! I desperately need that license!). If I can write 500 words a day, it's an achievement... Still, I want to make it clear that I'm determined to go through with this fic right up until the end! No abandonment here! So, as an apology gift and because I haven't had classes yesterday, I've made yet another really big chapter... and started a second Outtake - more on it after the text. Enjoy!**

**30 July 1997**

Days passed quickly and, sooner than everyone realized, July was reaching an end and Harry's birthday was one single day away. Everyone knew what that meant, although it was rarely spoke of for the sake of general mental health – no one wanted to think that after Bill and Fleur's wedding, which would take place in the first day of August, Harry could leave at any moment.

No one was sure if it would be the day after, the week after… only Harry knew when – he wanted his family and friends to be able to honestly say they didn't fully know about his plans to leave (at least not fully) if any questioning came up. Truth was, he knew he had to go, he had to track down the Horcruxes as soon as possible… he just wasn't sure how ready he was to go or to leave his family. Logic told him he should do it right after the wedding – not wait a minute more. But he couldn't help feeling that he wanted to stay. He had a family and, with the constant danger all around, part of him desperately wanted to stick around and make sure they would be alright. He was sure they felt the same about him… Still, he didn't have the luxury of letting that be more than a passing thought. He was the chosen one, whatever that meant. The world rested on his shoulders.

So, the eve of his birthday was passed at the Burrow, either to enjoy those last days – they felt like hours, actually – he had with Ginny before leaving, or to settle the last details of their plans with his future travelling companions as Hermione would be arriving to join him and Ron at any moment. Practically everything was worked out so far: they'd already gathered most of what they needed, trained as much as they could and created what seemed to be the only slightly believable cover stories available – Ron's fictional burst of spattergroit, Hermione's alleged escape to Australia with her parents… They hadn't bothered to make one for him as it would be painfully obvious for everyone that mattered that he'd skipped Hogwarts to go after Voldermort. There would be questions, yes, but he could only hope that his family would manage to work around them.

"What time did Hermione say she was arriving again?" Mrs. Weasley asked as she stepped into the kitchen with a load of towels on her arms.

"She said she'd be at the edge of the wards at eleven sharp," Ginny replied as she sat opposite her boyfriend at the kitchen table. "Did Dad forget the time he was supposed to meet her there again?"

"No, dear, I just thought I'd go pick her up from there myself. Your father's quite busy entertaining Mr. Delacour," she said, looking at the Weasley family clock to check the time. "Have you seen Ronald, Ginny?"

"He's upstairs, showering. Hermione's coming – odds are he doesn't want to seem like a pig around her."

"Ginevra!" her mother said in outrage. "Don't be rude! Honestly, with guests in the house… What impression do you want to give?"

"Harry's used to it. He's basically part of the furniture already…" Ginny observed, smirking at her boyfriend, who smiled a little in return. He smiled less and less these days, she thought.

"I meant the Delacours," Molly said, exasperated, quickly turning to Harry. "Not that we're not happy to have you around, as always, dear."

"Thanks, Mrs. Weasley," he replied sheepishly. "Do you… do you need help with those?" he asked, pointing at the load of towels she was carrying.

"Oh, no, dear. No need – I'm just taking those out to the tables for lunch. I can manage on my own. You two stay here and enjoy your time together." And, with that, she made her way to the back door and exited the house, leaving Harry and Ginny alone in the kitchen.

The latter sighed. "You know what she's doing, right?"

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Concerning what?"

"You know, just leaving like that. Telling us to stay here and 'enjoy our time together' while she fiddles with the towels outside. Isn't it obvious what she's doing?"

Harry frowned. "Trying to keep herself busy so she can have a good reason to avoid Fleur and her mother?"

"No!" Ginny replied before pausing, thoughtful, and shrugging. "Well, yes. That too – hearing them speak in French all day long makes her nervous. But that's not what I was referring to." She sighed before continuing. "I strongly suspect that she's hoping I'll… _charm_ you into not leaving."

Her boyfriend gave her an odd look. "What are you talking about?"

"Well, Mom's not dumb. She knows something's going on with you and Ron and maybe even Hermione. She figured out that you three are planning to leave. She even cornered me the other day and asked me if I was planning to go too – threatened me to send me to Aunt Muriel's for the rest of the Summer if I was, by the way."

Harry raised his eyebrows. "And what did you tell her?"

"The truth," she said. "That I'm not planning to leave as of yet. But you know our deal, Harry – the minute I turn seventeen if you're still out there…"

"You'll join me there. I know. Believe me, I know," he replied sharply. He knew that very well and, although he knew how hard it could be – finding the Horcruxes, destroying them all and then Voldemort – he was determined to have it all over before her seventeenth birthday so she wouldn't join him. Because he knew he wouldn't be able to function, faced with all the danger that she'd be under.

"Good," Ginny replied, ignoring his tone. "Anyway, Mum's not happy that you, Ron and Hermione are planning to go at all, which led her to the conclusion that the best way to get you stay is by, well, rubbing me all over you. She's sure that either my constant presence will make you realize you'll miss me too much or that I'll try and change your mind somehow."

"Which you won't," Harry concluded.

She sighed. "We've been through this, Harry. I don't like the fact that you're leaving. I hate it, actually. But I know it's something you have to do and I like to believe I'm above trying to hold you back just for my peace of mind." It might cost her, she thought, it might hurt her and scare her beyond words but getting in Harry's way, keep him from doing the only thing that, as far as she knew, would give him peace was the one thing she was determined to never do. She owed him that much.

Harry just looked at her for a few seconds after she said that. Sometimes he wondered if she was for real, as he sometimes did about most positive aspects of his life… All that darkness, the constant tragedy that followed him often shadowed his ability to enjoy the good things he had in life, such as Ginny or having a family… yes, he did wonder how he would deal without them during his quest, which could take months… years, maybe. "I guess your Mom will be disappointed, then," he mumbled a few seconds later.

"I guess she will," Ginny replied. "But then again she won't if you all come back in one piece, which, I can promise, each one of you will dearly regret if you don't," she said, narrowing her eyes to make a point. It was with satisfaction that she saw Harry's face showing some nerves – he'd better take her seriously. "Now," she said, completely changing her tone to a much lighter one all of a sudden. "How about we skip to less tense matters?"

"What sort of matters?" he asked suspiciously.

"Your birthday tomorrow, of course," she told him, grinning. "What do you want as a present, for instance?"

He seemed to grow uncomfortable with her question, for some reason. "You don't have to worry about that," he replied in a sombre tone.

She raised her eyebrows. "Don't need to worry about what to get you? Right… sorry to be the one to tell you this, Harry, but you're not exactly an easy one to shop for, you know?"

He sighed. "Well, let me solve the problem for you, then," he said, trying to get her to drop the subject. "I don't want anything for my birthday."

She frowned. "Don't want anything for your birthday…"she said slowly.

"That's right," he replied, looking away towards the window, hoping that would settle it. His hopefulness didn't last, though, as he could practically feel Ginny's hard stare drilling into the side of his face. He glanced at her for a second in order to confirm it – yep, there it was. The stare. And he knew his girlfriend well enough to be sure it meant she wasn't buying any of it.

"Alright. Spill it, Potter," she told him.

"There's nothing to spill," he replied, a bit touchy.

"Oh, I'm sure there isn't. Aside from the reason why you're apparently insulting my intelligence by insisting that you don't want anything for your birthday."

"What's wrong with not wanting anything for my birthday?" he asked, a bit annoyed. Did she always have to see right through him? "And why does that have to mean anything more than what it is?"

"Well, it wouldn't mean anything more if you didn't have _the _look on tour face," she informed him. "You can't fool me with _the_ look."

Harry frowned. "Look? What look?"

"The '_I'm Harry Potter, the self-blaming git' _look," she stated. "What's this about, Harry?"

He sighed. "Gin…"

"Drop it," she warned him.

He huffed, then. "I most likely won't be here for your birthday, Gin. Doesn't seem all that fair that I get a birthday present from you when you won't get one from me."

Ginny pursed her lips together. It always came up. No matter how much she tried not to think of how, from in a couple of days on, Harry could leave at any moment, it always came up. She had no idea how to have any sort of communication with him from then on… "So that's what it's about?" she asked. "You think you don't get to have a birthday present because you won't be here to pay me back at mine?"

He sighed. "Let me guess. You think I'm an idiot," he said, trying to break the tension with a little bit of humour.

"Of the sweet sort. Yes," she informed him, her lips curling just a bit. "You don't get it, do you?"

"Get what?"

"You've already given me a present, you git. Look, as far as I know, back when you decided that you had to go and hunt Horcuxes, you were planning to leave just as soon as the clock hit midnight on the day of your birthday."

"Well, maybe not exactly…"

"Details aside, Harry," she indicated dismissively. "The point is that from then on, it was fair game. You could leave as soon as you wanted to. But then I asked you to stay for the wedding and you agreed. You gave us one extra day and, at the rate things are getting darker and darker, more and more dangerous, I'd say that's worth a few dozen birthday presents. And, okay, call me sappy for that. I know it is. But see if I care."

The intense look returned to Harry's face. He seemed somewhat saddened and cheered by her words. They were bittersweet, yes, knowing that things were so bad that they had to be satisfied with the littlest things like having one extra day together… still the fact that Ginny was willing to accept that at all, no complaints or discussions, made him proud. "So, one day? That's your present," he asked, just to be sure.

"One day," she repeated.

Harry sighed. There were problems, though… One of the few perks of them having been virtually isolated from the world all that summer had been not having to pretend they weren't a couple anymore as they had both agreed that their families were trustworthy enough to keep their secret relationship quiet – unfortunately, that wouldn't be the case during the wedding. "You do know that, through that day, we won't be able to actually go to the wedding as a couple, not only because we're officially not a couple anymore but also because of Mad-Eye's plan for me to only go to the wedding disguised with polijuice as some fake cousin of yours, right?" He groaned internally at that for the millionth time since Mad-Eye had exposed the plan to him. Polijuice… well, that was another bummer of being Harry Potter, he thought. Plenty of people were coming to the wedding – all supposedly trustworthy but, according to the old Auror, not enough to allow Harry Potter to walk around them in the open with practically no protection. Therefore, the plan was for him, as far as the other guests knew, 'come down' with a bad case of food poisoning which would leave him allegedly unable to attend the wedding. Instead, he'd have to show up impersonating a fictional member of the Weasley family through a heavy dose of Polijuice Potion.

"Well, I don't think anyone will lift a problem over me dancing with a cousin, would they? Provided we don't… take liberties, so to speak."

"Yes, that might be a bit… disturbing from an outsider's point of view."

"Definitely," she agreed. "I assure you, though, that I'd much rather do it with you looking like… well, you. I suppose I'll just have to wait for the next wedding for that," she declared, making an effort to look positive.

"I suppose," Harry agreed, although he didn't sound half as confident.

"Anyway, have you come up with a fake name already? I need to know what to refer you as then – calling you 'cousin' all day long would just be plain weird."

"Tell me about it," Harry mumbled. "But, no, no name yet. Though Fred and George were quick with suggestions…. starting with a quite interesting one: Randy Gitt-Weasley – note it's spelled with double t in 'Gitt'."

Ginny unsuccessfully tried to keep herself from bursting into laughter at that, making her boyfriend simply raise his eyebrows at her in a slightly annoyed fashion.

Aright, so it was a good one – he'd give her that much… "Glad to see you find this amusing, Gin."

She just kept on laughing for several more seconds, only stopping when her eyes were already filling with tears. "You know, I think you should use it. You should definitely use it – it has a nice ring to it."

"Yes, a bloody fantastic one," Harry mumbled moodily. "Can we change the subject now?"

"Sure… Randy," she agreed, fighting hard not to laugh some more. "Sorry, just trying it out."

Harry glared. "Don't keep your hopes up that you'll use it much at the wedding."

She just grinned in return. "We'll see about that… Now, since you want so much to change the subject, you still haven't given me a decent idea of a present to give you. Honestly, your birthday's tomorrow – it's not like I have a lot of time to come up with something… I've already put it off long enough, don't you think? So just go ahead and name something you could use, would you?"

Harry sighed. "I don't know, Gin… The one thing that comes to my mind is luck, maybe. Yeah, I could use some luck. Do you figure they sell it by the ounce at Diagon Alley?"

Ginny shrugged. "Maybe by the pint at Knockturn Alley – Fred and George told me they sell Felix Felicis in every corner over there since it's supposedly forbidden to sell in licensed shops. But then again, I suppose the odds of those being either fake or poorly brewed are higher than not – I wouldn't want to be the one behind you ending up poisoned. It leaves quite a loony cloud on you, attempting to kill an alleged ex-boyfriend and everything."

"Yes, it does give quite a lunatic impression," he agreed with a grin.

"It's a reputation-ruiner," she added dramatically. "Anyway, I'd offer to brew some Felix Felicis myself but it would probably lead to the same results. Maybe Fred and George could give it a try…"

"Forget it, Gin, I was just joking. Or, well, speaking about luck in general, not in liquid form," Harry informed her. "I don't want Felix Felicis."

"Why not? In a more serious note, Felix Felicis is one of the things you, Ron and Hermione could probably use during your quest."

Harry shook his head. "It's too risky, Gin. We've talked about this – Ron, Hermione and I. Did you know that Felix Felicis can be addictive? I didn't. According to what Hermione read, if you take more than two full doses in a month, you have an eighty percent chance of getting addicted to it, which leads to the obvious consequences of taking too much Felix Felicis, starting with it reversing its effects and causing you bad luck and ending with death. I think we'd rather take our chances than risking that, Gin."

She seemed quite alarmed, looking at him. "Merlin, Harry…"

"I know. It would all be so much easier if we could just take a dose of Felix every morning without any bad consequences, would it?" he asked.

She nodded. "I guess this proves than when things seem too good to be true, they usually are…"

"Hard to deny that," he agreed.

"So, no Felix Felicis for your birthday, then…"

"No potions in general – Hermione's been brewing all the ones we'll need at home, so don't worry about that," he assured her.

She huffed. "You're making this gift-shopping thing even harder for me, Potter. Just name something already before I go mad and punch you."

He huffed as well. Birthday presents were simply the farthest thing away from his mind – honestly, with everything that was going on, he didn't really feel like he was one day away from turning seventeen… It didn't feel like his birthday at all, so he couldn't say he was inspired for gift-listing… But then, it hit him – the perfect present in more than one way. "I suppose one day would also be a good present for me."

She frowned. "Hey – the extra-day is _my_ present already. I'm sorry to tell you that I don't like to share my presents," Ginny told him, mostly joking.

"No, not that day," he told her. "Another one."

"So you'll stay two extra days?" Ginny asked, hopeful.

He shook his head. "Not now, Gin. After. You get your day now, before I go. A little ahead of time, yes, considering your birthday's still a couple of weeks away, but I owe it to you. As for me, I'll get mine when I come back." _Provided I do come back, _he thought. "Just the two of us, away from all the madness – well, mostly the two of us, at least. So I have something to look forward to."

"You have plenty to look forward," Ginny said, a bit annoyed by the way he'd used his words. Something to look forward to. "You're seventeen – there's still a lot you haven't experienced yet. A lot neither of us have."

"Good – we can start working on it that day," he said, settling it.

"So, a day for you as well," she concluded. "No date settled yet?"

He shook his head – how could he possibly set a date when he wasn't even sure how long it would be before he saw her again after his quest begun? "I'll leave it for you to surprise me."

"Okay. I can work with that. A day. And you'd better expect one hell of a day. But I have one condition."

"Name it."

"If this thing takes long – the horcrux hunt – and we have to put this off further than your birthday next year, this day becomes a week," she declared.

He raised his eyebrows. "I'm starting to think this is more of a present for you than it is for me."

She grinned, leaning further onto the table so she was a few inches closer to Harry across the table. "I knew you were a smart bloke. And if it takes another year after your birthday next year, it becomes a month."

"Greedy, aren't you?" he asked, leaning a bit closer as well

She ignored him. "Another year and it becomes a month. Then another and it becomes a year as well… you can follow my train of thought to guess what's next."

"A decade and a century," he concluded. Strangely, maybe, hearing her saying that made him… happy. Because he could read between the lines – this was her way of telling him she'd wait for him no matter how long it took. She was planning to join him, yes, but she was promising she wouldn't give up if she had to wait either. "Funny thing, now I'm wondering if I should make this last a while just to get that century…"

"Maybe if you get back sooner than one year from now, you'll get that day with much more than a century on the side," she suggested, shifting on her chair so she was kneeling on it, which allowed her to reach further across the table – luckily, it wasn't too wide, which allowed her face to remain rather close to Harry's, close enough to allow her to kiss him easily if she wanted to.

He grinned more widely than he'd grinned for a long time. "I'll aim for the day, then, and hope for that extra."

"Wise choice not to keep me waiting," she informed him, leaning further millimetre by millimetre.

Only, when it seemed she was just about to kiss him, they heard the kitchen door bursting open, followed by a highly exaggerated disgust remark. "Ugh, Ginny, we eat at that table!" Ron's voice came.

She looked at him, murderous glare in her eyes as Harry blushed in embarrassment. "Tell me, Ron, just tell me how the hell us kissing over the table, barely even touching it is going to affect the quality of the food we eat on it in any way!"

"Maybe not the food but my appetite for sure! How can I eat there picturing you two snogging on the table?"

"_Over _the table. Over it, not on it," Harry remarked urgently. "And I don't think anything can affect your appetite, mate. No offence."

"Yes, offence," Ginny mumbled under her breath.

Ron tried to ignore that, approaching the window and looking through it. "Is Hermione here yet?"

"No," Harry and Ginny chorused.

"Isn't it eleven already?" he asked, a bit too anxiously and being terrible at hiding it.

Harry rolled his eyes. "She'll be here in no time, Ron."

"Yeah, Ron, don't get your knickers in a twist," Ginny mocked. "Your girlfriend won't blow you off."

"She's not my girlfriend!" he barked back, blushing.

"She'd be if you hadn't been such an idiot last year with Lavender," his sister pointed out.

"Shut up!"

"You shut up!" Ginny yelled just as the door leading to the outside opened, allowing her mother to step in.

"… and as you can see," Mrs. Weasley was saying, "nothing has changed when it comes to my children acting like barbarians."

"I can see that," Hermione observed, stepping into the kitchen as well and raising her eyebrows at the scene as she carried a trunk along. "Nothing has changed _at all,"_ she repeated as she approached her friends, giving each a hung.

"Merlin, Hermione, you've just got here and you're scolding us already?" Ron said as he got his turn at sharing a rather awkward hug with Hermione.

"The girl just knows you too well to have to deal with pleasantries, Ronald," his mother remarked, giving Hermione a look of approval, before she walked to the nearest cupboard in order to fetch some plates. "And at least try to pretend you have some manners and take her trunk upstairs, would you?"

"Mom…"

"It's alright, Mrs. Weasley – it's not too heavy," Hermione assured her before turning to the others and sitting down as the older woman stepped out with the plates. "So, I take it everything is well… or as well as it's possible. Where's Izzy?"

"She stayed back at Grimmauld Place," Harry told her. "Plotting for my birthday, I imagine – she and aunt Mia seemed pretty eager to see me out."

"And _you _looked surprised by me being interested in your birthday," Ginny mumbled under her breath.

Harry ignored his girlfriend's remark. "Anyway, Izzy told me she'd show up later. Shouldn't take long."

"Well, tell you what," Ginny started, "why don't the three of you go have some trio time while I stay here and wait for Izzy?"

"Trio time?" Hermione asked, confused.

"Plot against evil, make mad plans, figure the world out," she specified. "You'd better get going while Mom's out – somehow I don't think she'll be too happy about seeing you doing that plotting, especially if it concerns your plans to leave."

Ron shivered. "Yes, it might be a good idea for us to make a run for it while she's outside, then…" he had to agree.

"Are you sure you don't want to come too?" Harry asked his girlfriend.

She shook her head. "Trio time. Not quartet time. Don't worry about me – I'm sure Mom will have plenty of shores for me to do once she realizes I'm no longer trying to trap you with my charms."

He raised his eyebrows at her but stood up anyway. "Alright, then," he agreed as Ron was already reaching for Hermione's trunk to carry it upstairs.

They'd been lucky to have exited the room at that exact moment, Ginny thought about ten seconds later as she saw her mother stepping back into the kitchen only to find her all alone in it. Molly frowned immediately at that.

"Where did the others go?"

"Upstairs – I imagine they must be helping Hermione unpacking…"

Molly's frown deepened. "Somehow I find that hard to believe." And, with that, she started making her way to the stairs.

"Wait, Mom," Ginny said before she reached them, making her mother turn around. "You can say all you want, try all you can but that won't keep them from leaving. Tomorrow all three of them will be off age, you know? So, do you really think the right thing to do now is keeping them from doing the planning they need to do and that will hopefully bring them back the same way they went?"

Molly's lips pursed together as she stared at her daughter. She knew her daughter – she could tell that underneath that apparently calm exterior Ginny was struggling with the notion of those three, mainly Harry, going away to Merlin-knew-where. That was why her words hit her so deeply. They wouldn't change their minds, so the only thing left to do now was allowing them to do what they could to make it through… Part of her wanted to go upstairs anyway, dictate shores and hope that keeping Ron, Harry and Hermione apart would hold them off, even if temporarily. Still, she didn't.

"Go get the table started outside, Ginny," she told her daughter, moving towards the counter without looking at her.

Behind her, Ginny did something she rarely went along with: getting up and doing what her mother had told her to do without a sound of protest. She supposed her mom deserved that much after the step they'd just taken.

And then, left alone in that kitchen, Molly did the only thing that, she realized at that moment, she could do from then on. Wait and hope for the best.

**

* * *

**

**Later that day**

Bored, Sirius thought. He was actually bored, he thought, half in disbelief… Izzy and Harry were at the Burrow, Mia had gone to Lulu's with little Mary for some 'girly' time – his mother-in-law had made it rather clear that no males were allowed in whatever they were doing, to the point of pushing a bunch of errands on Gabe to basically kick him out of his own home – and Alex was, well, he thought, glancing at his son's sleeping form beside him on the sofa, pretty much passed out for the rest of the afternoon, having exhausted himself running all over the house like a barbarian.

Huffing, Sirius couldn't help feeling a bit embarrassed by his own boredom. What could he say? He'd gotten used to always having something to do, someone to entertain and, unless he was willing to go challenge Kreacher for a game of chess – not bloody likely! – that didn't seem to be an option at the moment. Honestly, he'd be the first one to admit that that had been pretty much the last day when he'd expected to be bored – the eve of Harry's birthday, only days before he was supposed to leave… It was supposed to be a hectic day with last-chance training and packing driving everyone mad – no space for boredom.

Somehow, that hadn't been the case, though, and they'd end up sending Harry to the Burrow so he could spend some time with his friends and girlfriend while he, Mia and Izzy could busy themselves with the details for his birthday – he supposed Mia was mostly looking at the party as a farewell one, though not the permanent sort. A moment of happiness and celebration before their kid had to leave on his mission that only Merlin knew where would lead or how long would last…

He shook his head, willingly censoring himself and turning his attention to the Muggle telly opposite him – Harry's mission was definitely not what he wanted to be mulling over until someone came to distract him or Alex decided to wake up. That would be plain depressing.

He grabbed what he thought of as the 'telly-wand thing' and used it to flip though the channels, looking for something that would grab his attention. After changing channel after channel, skipping from program after program, he ended up settling with what seemed to be a transmission of a Muggle football game, which seemed interesting enough…

It was about ten minutes later, right about the time when he was getting bored again, that the answer to his prays came when that he realized he wasn't alone in the room anymore since someone other than Kreacher spoke.

"I simply can't understand the Muggles' fascination with that thing," the voice said from the doorway.

Recognizing the voice immediately, Sirius didn't bother to turn around to check who it was. "That's what I've been thinking for the past ten minutes, Moony. No brooms, no bludgers… it's like they throw away all the fun. What's the point of just watching a silly little ball rolling around the field as s bunch of blokes chase after it? Honestly…"

"I did mean television in general but, well, I suppose that may also be an issue too," Remus pointed out as he approached his friend, sitting down on an armchair by the sofa Sirius lounged on. He had to raise his eyebrows when he noticed his godson's sleeping form by Sirius's side on the sofa, all wrapped around his constantly present stuffed dog. "Shouldn't you take him to bed? Alex?"

Sirius shrugged. "He seems pretty fine to me down here – little bugger exhausted himself into a stupor running all over the house." He chuckled and reached to absently rub his son's dark, soft hair. The little boy didn't react or move an inch, so deep he was engulfed in his sleep. "Sleeps like a rock wherever he ends up falling. Though I can't say that was the case in that rather interesting first year of his life." He turned to Remus and grinned even though he did note his friend seemed quite down. Any other day, the fact that Moony looked more tired and greyer than usual would have been a reason to worry – nevertheless, being that night full moon, Sirius honestly had to admit his friend didn't seem all that bad, bearing in mind the circumstances. More than once, he'd seen Remus much worse in that occasion and, knowing there was nothing he could do about his friend's pitiful state, Sirius chose to simply go on with that banter, hoping that would cheer him up, even if just a little. "I've got to say I'm looking forward to see your sorry, sleep-deprived arse a few months from now."

Remus gave him a blank look. "I'm sure I won't look much worse than I do now."

"If you're expecting me to compliment your appearance out of pity, then forget it," he said dryly. "So, what do I owe to this oh so early visit? I thought we were meeting at the cottage later for our 'monthly bloke time', so to speak."

His friend sighed tiredly. "Well, Fred and George kicked me out of the shop under threat of firing me if I step a toe back in it before the day after tomorrow. As they do every month, of course, though I'm not fully sure about how committed they are to that threat… Anyway, I thought I'd come by and do some defence practicing with Harry since I have the time."

His friend gave him a 'you're joking' sort of look before he snorted. "I'm sorry to be the one breaking the news to you, mate, but you look like you could be knocked out by a tickling charm, so if you think I'm about to let you face the kid's pretty mean stunners, you're out of your mind."

"Sirius…" the other man started, huffing.

"Not to mention that he's at the Burrow at the moment, which makes him quite unavailable to wipe the floor with you. But, since you're here, you can work on keeping me entertained. So, tell me, Moony, how's my favourite pregnant cousin doing?"

Remus sighed. "Dora's just fine, thank you for asking, although I don't imagine she's too happy with me at the moment…"

Sirius raised his eyebrows. "Merlin… just what did you do this time?"

The other man huffed and sunk back against the armchair. "Nothing _that _bad. I just suggested that… well, that auror-related work is a job a bit too… straining, not to mention risky for a woman in her condition."

Huffing, Sirius rolled his eyes. What was he doing? "Merlin, Moony, don't you know a thing about pregnant women?"

"Well, it's not like I've had to deal with one much before. Besides, you're one to talk – didn't Mia kick you out plenty of times when she was pregnant?"

"That's exactly why I'm the perfect person to talk to," Sirius told him like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "First lesson on how to deal with your pregnant spouse – don't tell her what she should or shouldn't do. Those pregnancy hormones are like a bomb just waiting to explode right on your face."

Remus sighed. "She's far too early on to be throwing hormonal fits."

"Oh, you go on thinking of that," Sirius told him with a laugh. "You'd better get used to the feeling of sleeping on the sofa, though…"

"I'm already sleeping on the sofa – she's still holding a grudge about my… reaction to her being pregnant. Not that I blame her for it at all."

Sirius bit his lower lip to keep himself from laughing. "Well, if she's like that already, you're in for a bunch of fun months, Moony."

Remus sighed. "Tell me about it," he mumbled.

That had Sirius laughing. "I see you're still getting used to the idea of having a little one on the way," he observed.

"I think I won't get used to it at all until that baby is born," the other man replied. "I owled Elizabeth, by the way… About the baby, I mean. I wanted to see what she had to say about the chances of it being… like me. Curse-wise."

Sirius furrowed his brows. "And what did she say?"

"Well, she called me a bunch of names at first – apparently, she's heard of my… reaction to the pregnancy," Remus admitted, his tone rather low.

"Well, that does sound like something she'd do," Sirius observed, chuckling. "And?"

"And then she proceeded to point out that werewolves are made, not born, and that if, by any chance, the bay was a werewolf, it probably wouldn't have made it through the first full moon, one month ago – the transformation would have been too much for a… embryo that small," Remus explained, looking a bit pained with the bare idea. "She strongly advised me to get a hobby other than worrying – I'm not sure how to feel about that advice."

"Embrace it, what else? She's a smart one, that Elizabeth. And you know it – if she says it probably hasn't a furry little problem, then it doesn't," Sirius pointed out, grinning. "Look, mate, so far things are good. Just worry about keeping Tonks happy while she's carrying that kid, living through her mood swing and, well, leaning how to change diapers because, trust me, you'll need it badly. The rest will solve itself – honestly, this having a kid thing is like everything: there are a million things that can go wrong, werewolf parent or not, but most of the time they don't. If you obsess over them… well, you'll probably be a nutcase before the little one's even born. So, sit back and enjoy… and maybe pray the kid will be a calm little soldier like you and not a hyperactive bomb like Mommy or else you won't have a full night of sleep for a while."

Remus took a breath and smiled just little. "I wouldn't mind the hyperactive bomb."

"Aw, look at that, Alex," Sirius mocked, turning to his completely oblivious sleeping son. "Isn't your uncle Moony adorable? In love and everything… Wonder if he sings too. Love songs and all that cra…"

"Shut up, Padfoot," his friend interrupted him with a mumble.

Sirius laughed at that. "Come on – embrace the feeling, mate. I mean, look at us: all married and having kids… grown up, you know? Prongs would be proud of us – he was always the family bloke out of all of us."

Remus couldn't deny that was true. He missed his friends, he thought, James and Lily. They should have been the ones with the big family. Sometimes, he just felt like his future child was a misplaced miracle…

"Now, what you have to do is to go and court your wife and get her to forget that tiff of yours," Sirius instructed him. "Tell her you're an idiot and give her those poor 'it's full moon tonight, so give me a break' eyes – I know for a fact she has a soft spot for them. Get some flowers too, maybe. And chocolate – yeah, she's bound to have cravings of chocolate with you as her kid's father…"

"Should I start taking notes?" Remus asked dryly.

"No. What you should do was getting your sorry arse out of that chair and into the ministry in order to pick your wife up from work and get started with the courting. You've got…" he paused, checking his watch "… four hours before the moon rise. Use them wisely and then don't forget to tell the story – provided it doesn't get kinky."

His friend stared at him. "You're not serious."

Sirius grinned. "Of course I am – even in name."

"Not the Sirius/serious jokes," Remus mumbled, huffing in disgust. "I thought we'd agreed early in our friendship that you were not to use that kind of joke – it's just too easy and way below you. James even made you put that in writing."

"It was just too tempting this time – couldn't resist," he said, smirking. "Now, get a move on, Moony. Use your cards well and you might just go back to sleeping in your bed after tonight."

Remus rolled his eyes at his friend as he got up. "You're impossible, Padfoot," he said, heading to the door

"You're welcome," Sirius replied, grinning as his friend walked out. "And tell Tonks I'm still waiting for an answer on my naming request."

"_We're not calling it Sirius!_" Remus shouted back from outside the room.

He snorted at that – no need to say he wasn't actually hoping the kid would be his namesake… Shaking his head, Sirius turned to his son, still sleeping despite the noise, although he seemed to have shifted his position at some point, now sucking on his thumb. "Merlin, you could sleep right through a bloody earthquake, couldn't you?" he asked the little boy, not expecting an answer.

Seeing himself alone again with his sleeping kid and the football game on the telly, Sirius almost regretted not keeping Moony around a little longer to take the piss out of him some more – but sending him away was for a good cause, after all. He and Tonks were good together – no need for them to waste time with little fights, especially hormone-induced ones. Plus, he supposed Mia should be coming back at any moment…

He didn't have the time to finish that thought, though, as it was interrupted by the sound of voices outside the room, seemingly coming from the lower floors, announcing someone else's arrival at the house.

"… _simply can't believe you didn't bother to give it another look in this month and a half you've spent at home since you got it! Honestly, Harry!" _Sirius heard a feminine voice he quickly identified as Hermione's saying from the stairs outside the room.

"Looks like the kids are back," Sirius mumbled to himself, glancing at the door.

"_Lay off him, Hermione. That bloody thing only brings him bad memories – if it were me, I wouldn't want to look at it either,"_ another voice, seemingly Ginny's, added.

"_But we could have researched…"_

"_Researched what? Who wrote it?"_ Harry finally spoke. "_You did it yourself when we checked Hogwarts's list of former students. There are hundreds of witches and wizards in Britain with R.A.D. as initials!"_

The note, he thought, motioning to get up. They were talking about _the _note inside the fake Horcrux, the one Harry had last mentioned weeks ago, signed with a bunch of initials belonging to some bloke who'd stolen the real Horcrux that was supposed to have been in the cave Harry and Dumbledore had visited in the last day of the latter's life. Merlin, hadn't he been meaning to ask the kid about it for weeks? He suddenly recalled.

"_I think it was R.A.V._," Ron mumbled.

"_R.A.B.!_" Hermione shouted. "_It was R.A._B_., not D or V! Honestly, was I the only one who bothered to look at that note with the slightest bit of attention?"_

Izzy was the next one to speak. _"Well, B, D and V do sound a bit alike, don't they?"_ she pointed out, her tone slightly absent like she was thinking of something else entirely.

"_Still. We have that locket, we have that note – they're bound to be what will lead us to the stolen Horcux. We need to study it, Harry," _Hermione declared as the voices got closer and Sirius started to make his way to the door.

"_Well, what do you think I'm doing taking you upstairs, then?_ _It's in my trunk._" Sirius heard Harry saying just he stepped into the corridor. The kid was quick on his feet – by the time he stepped out, his godson had already beaten him upstairs, Sirius noted, and was halfway through climbing the last flight of stairs leading up to his bedroom's floor, followed closely by Ron and Hermione. Ginny and Izzy seemed to be several steps behind, though.

"What's going on?" Sirius asked the girls.

"Hermione's back and already getting those two to dot their i's and cross their t's," Ginny explained as Izzy remained quiet.

"Starting with that locket situation, I see – I completely forgot about it myself," Sirius admitted.

Ginny nodded. "You're not the only one, apparently. But she's pretty shocked Harry didn't bother to investigate the locket or the note. Honestly, I don't think it would have made a difference – can you imagine? Searching for a bunch of initials would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack."

"I take it she'll take doing that upon herself, though," Sirius guessed easily.

The redhead let out a little chuckle. "Well, it's Hermione, isn't it?" That said it all.

Chuckling too, he turned to his daughter. "What's with you, Izzybel? You're awfully quiet."

"Don't want to talk about it," she said through her teeth.

"She's still wondering how she went along with Fleur's sudden idea to make her a last-minute bridesmaid. One of the initial ones got ill," Ginny explained.

"A bridesmaid?" Sirius asked, almost amused. "Where did that come from?"

"Don't. Want. To talk. About it," she murmured in a rather intense fashion.

"It's George's fault, really," the redhead provided.

Turning slowly, Izzy gave her best friend a glare that could kill – she didn't even need to say a word for both Ginny and her father to know it was time to drop it. A story for another time, Sirius imagined.

"Well, I don't know about you but I think it's time I lay my eyes in the famous fake Horcrux," Sirius said before taking a step back into the living room in order to glance at his son, noting he was still asleep. Just in case, he summoned Kreacher to keep an eye on the boy before making his way upstairs, Ginny and Izzy following him as well.

When they got to Harry's room – what many would dramatically think of as the chosen one's quarters – it seemed like a hurricane has passed through it. Harry appeared to be kneeling on the floor, elbow deep in the trunk resting in front of his bed, throwing everything from the old newspapers to the dirty socks he found in there all over the room as he tried to dig out the locket.

"Merlin, Harry, when was the last time you bothered to tidy up that trunk even just a little?" Hermione said, looking around at the chaos he'd created in a matter of seconds in shock.

"He throws everything in there," Izzy mumbled. "He knows Mom will yell if she sees his room messy, so he just hides most of it into the trunk. Slob."

"Well, excuse me if I haven't had much time to worry about cleaning," Harry mumbled, removing what seemed to be a bag of owl treats from the trunk.

"Isn't Kreacher the one in charge of cleaning the house? He's the house-elf," Ron mumbled, opening a box of chocolate frogs Harry had dug up as Hermione glared at him over his blunt disrespect of house elves.

"Mia has them in charge of their own rooms when they're home from school," Sirius informed him. "She thinks it builds character."

"She's right about that," Hermione said in approval. "Any sign of the locket yet, Harry?"

"I think I see something sparkling down there," Ginny, who'd joined her boyfriend's digging at some point, declared.

"Wait let me just…" Harry mumbled, interrupting himself as he reached further into the mess. Seconds later, his arm finally came up, holding the heavy gold locket in his hand. "Found it," he said, his tone low as he seemed to make an effort not to look at the object.

"Let me see that," Sirius told him, reaching forward with his hand.

Harry passed it without a fuss as he got up and joined Ron and Ginny, now sitting on the bed.

Sirius observed the locket closely, raising an eyebrow at it – it was truly a horrid piece of jewellery. Seemed like something his mother would wear in her worst day. "You sure this isn't really a Horcrux? Seems creepy enough to be one."

Harry shook his head. "It isn't – I'm sure of it. If it was, there would be a really… heavy feeling – not the physical sort, just a feeling in your head – when you held it. Like there was something dark in it."

Ginny nodded. "I felt that with the diary," she said sombrely.

"Plus, there's the note," Hermione stated, turning to Harry. "Where is it?"

"Inside the locket," Harry told her. "I left it there, I think. You can open it," he informed his godfather. "There's this thing on the side…"

"I see it," Sirius said, touching the seam and popping it open. Inside, there was a little piece of parchment, which he removed from there before passing the locket to Hermione, who seemed eager to get her hands on it.

He unfolded the note carefully as the parchment seemed damaged by the time and, as soon as it was open in front of him, he froze.

It wasn't the content of the note or the initials that made his bare foundations shake – it was the handwriting. He didn't need more than a second to recognize it. Slightly different from how he remembered it, yes – more flourished maybe – but still so familiar and so similar to his own. Why similar, one would ask… maybe because the first letters of the alphabet its owner had ever written had been with Sirius coaching him through it – showing off the fact that he could finally write… sharing that new skill with the best friend he had at the time. R.A.B. – suddenly it all made sense… All pieces clicked.

"What?" Harry asked, noticing the change on his godfather's face. "Does that note ring a bell to you?"

Sirius looked up, still dumb-stuck and barely registering the five teenagers staring at him. "I know who wrote this," he mumbled, his voice tinted with disbelief.

The reaction was immediate. What? Who? How? All questions came at the same time in tones nearly as stunned as his.

"You know who R.A.B. is?" Hermione asked for the second or third time, finally getting his attention.

"Yes," Sirius said. "He's Regulus Arcturus Black. My brother."

**A/N: So, the plot is finally advancing - Sirius has discovered RAB! This will continue next chapter. **

**Now, as for the outtake - some of you may be wondering about the Bridesmaid thing Izzy and Ginny mentioned - well, it will be devoloped in my second outtake 'Ten Steps to Unwillingly Become a Bridesmaid' - the format is rather different from my usual one, let me warn you. I suppose I should also mention the main characters are Izzy and a certain redheaded twin... This outtake should be posted sometime in the next week - depending on my workload then...**

**That said, feedback is welcome! Review!**


	43. Regulus

**A/N: So, it was a while before in managed to get this chapter posted... In my defence, I did give you an outtake on my birthday _and _I've spent a week in Ireland for my annual vacation :D Anyway, I hope you like this chapter - I personally loved to write it, though there were at least 3 pages of scrapped material... *sigh* Maybe one of these days I'll have it recycled.**

He hadn't stepped foot into that room for more than twenty years. Seemed like a lifetime ago but, still, his brother's old bedroom looked almost exactly the same as it had back before Sirius had ran away from home and gotten disinherited.

How everything else had changed since then, apparently…

His mind was still trying to process it, figuring it out… Regulus had stolen a Horcrux. He'd stood up to Voldemort and that had more than likely been what had gotten him killed.

Merlin, Sirius thought as he remained sat on the bed that had once belonged to his brother. He'd needed to leave, to get some time on his own, away from the kids' shock and their incessant questions that were only summed with his own. It was just too much… Too many thoughts, too many doubts, too many… possibilities that branched into yet some more, making an unbelievable mess of feelings that only served to trash his head. He wasn't quite sure why he'd come to his brother's room for escape but he'd certainly ended up there… maybe he was looking for answers even though, so far, all he'd done was sitting in that bed, as motionless as a statue while the words of that note he'd left downstairs replayed in his mind like a broken record.

Sirius could honestly say he wasn't one to remember things word by word – no photographic memory for him. Mostly, he just understood the notions of things and remembered the heart of the matter. Yet, that bloody note seemed to be the exception to his nature, having been branded in his head like nothing had ever been before. Especially the last part of it.

"…_I have stolen the real horcrux and intend to destroy it as soon as I can. I face death in the hope that when you meet your match, you will be mortal once more. R.A.B."_

"Merlin, Reg, what the hell did you do?" he muttered under his breath, letting his back fall down against the old bed, a cloud of dust releasing itself to the air from the covers.

He just lay there, silent and with his eyes closed for what seemed to be hours when, in fact, it was just a few minutes. He simply wasn't really keeping track of time at the moment. Maybe he was waiting, maybe he was… hanging in there. He just didn't really feel like doing anything other than lying there, despite the shocking amount of dust covering the surface he lay on.

More minutes passed and, at some point, he felt the bed moving before the feeling of something, or rather someone, passing a hand through his hair had him opening his eyes again. Mia, he thought as soon as he saw her face over his.

"What happened?" she asked in a very soft tone even though Harry and Izzy had already filled her in with what they knew – she supposed Sirius giving her his own account of facts would be a good way to start a conversation.

He didn't speak, though – just lay there, observing her for a few seconds. Mia had honestly expected him to look worse, shocked, angry or something… instead, he simply looked thoughtful. She wasn't sure if she should be relieved or concerned about that. In any case, her hand remained on his hair, caressing it in a soothing manner.

"Sirius?" she asked again, seconds later.

He didn't respond. Instead, he just sat up, shifting to a position that put him side-by-side with her. Then, he leaned forward, his lips capturing hers into a kiss. A rather sweet, innocent one that reminded him of their first, by the lake at Hogwarts. Such a long time before, he thought. About as long as the time when he'd lost his brother. Not to death – no, that had been years later – but to the prejudice and dark ideas that had turned them into strangers.

He sighed when their lips broke away from each other and buried his face against the crook of her neck, wrapping his arms around Mia's form. She held him back tightly, silently rubbing his back, feeling he might need it at the moment.

Her hair smelled wonderfully, as always, Sirius noted, like chamomile with a little bit of baby powder too – so Mia; so warm; so _his_. She knew him better than anyone else did… and he was confident he knew her better than anyone too… How he wished at the moment he could say the same about his late brother…

A few moments later, Mia was the one to pull away, kissing his lips softly one more time before cupping his face and looking him in the eyes. "Tell me," she requested. "Please tell me what you're thinking."

"I was thinking that I love you," he told her.

She gave him a little smile, though she was aware he wasn't telling her everything. "I love you too. Now tell me the rest."

He took a deep breath and looked her in the eyes too, raising an eyebrow after a few seconds. "You already know the rest – I can tell by your face. You'd look more concerned if you didn't."

She smiled. "You know me too well… But, as talented as they are, I don't think Izzy or Harry can read your mind and fill me in what you're feeling, which is really what I want to know. So, tell me, Sirius."

He sighed. "I didn't know him at all."

"By _him_ I assume you mean your brother," Mia said, softly.

Sirius nodded. "All this time, ever since Reg became a Death Eater, I've thought of him as some… idiotic kid who'd gotten himself killed in the end because he'd tried to bite way more than he could chew. As far as I knew, he'd died just as another one of the many bad guys and traitors the oh-so-noble Black family had created. But today, nearly two bloody decades later…"

"…you found out he actually died a hero," Mia finished for him.

He huffed, looking away at the heavy-curtain-covered window. "What sort of hero, though? He spends years religiously following the steps of his little Death Eater pals and, for all I know, he was right there in the front line, murdering all sorts of innocent people… and then he goes around and _steals_ a Horcrux. Just what the hell was going on that kid's head? Part of me really, really feels like I should wonder if stealing a Horcrux – and doing Merlin-knows-what with it, mind you – was really some unselfish action for the sake of humanity in general, bearing in mind precedent. It would be the logical thing to do, you know? Being sceptical. Because I really feel that by letting my guard down and believing that he'd suddenly become a good person, I'm putting myself on the line for being let down – and, dumbly enough, that's exactly what I'm doing." It had taken him _years_ to accept, painfully, that his little brother was not to be trusted anymore and only seconds for him to let himself believe blindly in that note… he was setting himself for heartbreak all over again. He really thought he was.

"He was your brother, Sirius – you have a right to give him the benefit of the doubt – you shouldn't feel guilty or stupid about that," Mia let him know.

"Shouldn't I? Because right now, it's starting to feel like he died all over again." Which would probably not be the case if he'd remained sceptical. Which he couldn't, no matter how he wanted to. Stupidly so.

His wife soothingly rested her hand on his shoulder. "It's only natural you feel that way, Sirius. You've never allowed yourself to grieve him before. I remember when you got the news that he was gone… or rather read if it on the Prophet's obituary. It was like, in your head, you were just learning that some stranger had died, not your brother. It worried me at the time."

"It _was _a stranger who'd died… or at least I thought so, at the time," he said – that was another reason why he should have remained sceptical... "Because there was no way I could let myself believe that the lanky, painfully shy kid who used to chase me around when we were little could have become some cold-blooded murderer. I couldn't let myself believe that I'd let him."

"You didn't," Mia said, determined. "Even if, in the end, he hadn't done the right thing – and nothing in that note, which Harry has just showed me, by the way, inclined me to believe he had any ulterior motives – it would have never been your fault that Regulus became a Death Eater. Time after time you tried to make him see reason and it crushed you whenever he'd reject it."

Sirius shook his head. And there it was again… the guilt. "I gave up," he countered. "At some point, I'm not sure when, I just gave up… I just ran away from home and left him alone there to be poisoned more and more by my parent's ridiculous beliefs."

"Only after you tried everything. Only when you simply couldn't put yourself through it yet another time. There was nothing else you could do. I saw how much it cost you, Sirius – no one in their right minds would blame you – not even Regulus himself if he was _anything _like you."

Sighing again, Sirius refrained himself from replying, simply looking around the room. "He was always the good son out of the two of us. He always obeyed, always respected our parents without a word in return. I didn't – the more trouble I caused, the more grief I gave, the best. I guess that's what saved me in the end."

Mia frowned. "What do you mean?"

He took a long, deep breath before turning to his wife. "Why do you think I started defying my family about the whole blood-purity thing in the beginning, Mia?" he asked. "By the time they started preaching it to me, I was five and the only thing I knew about prejudice was that it was a big, fancy word. No right or wrong about it. The thing was, I was smart enough to gather it was vital to my parents that I agreed with them and accepted 'mudbloods' were the devil… so, the only logical thing to do in my rebellious five-year-old brain was exactly the opposite."

"So you decided to side with muggle-borns just for the sake of irking your parents," Mia said, just a little amused. It sounded _just _like something Sirius would have done.

"I sure did," Sirius confirmed. "I didn't like them back then. Not one bit. If you asked me why I didn't, so early on, I probably wouldn't be able to tell you – they might be cold and brisk but I just didn't have anyone else better to compare them to, did I? Still, I just could tell something wasn't right with them. It's that gut feeling you get sometimes, you know?"

Mia nodded. "I understand."

"So, at first I just disagreed for the sake of giving them grief. But over the years, especially with Andromeda around (seeing as she appeared to be the only other person with a non-twisted sense of morals in my family), I started to realize that maybe I'd made the right choice for more than one reason… And then I got into Hogwarts, was sorted into Gryffindor, met you and the guys… more and more I saw I was on the right side. And, in the meanwhile, for that first year I was at school Reg stayed at home being a good son and getting educated from dawn to dusk in a proper Black manner, starting with the classic 'having Muggle blood is bad' matter and ending with the 'Voldemort is the answer to all out preys' theme – this time, without me there to try and shield him from it." Mia was about to say something then, but he stopped her, touching her lips with his index finger. "I'm not saying he didn't have any fault at becoming a Death Eater – he made the choice, after all. No one was threatening to join – he knew he had me out there if he wanted to make a run for it too… But, Merlin, had we been born in any other family, he could have been a bloody great kid."

"We can't pick the families we're born into, Sirius. You know that," Mia told him.

"Yeah. I know that. And that just sucks, you know?" he agreed before going silent again for several seconds, looking around the room once more, reminiscent. The only glaring difference he could spot in that room from what he remembered before leaving was what seemed to be a patchwork of newspaper clippings on one of the walls – the one right opposite the bed.

He stood up and approached the wall while Mia remained sitting on the bed, understanding he might need some space. Sirius felt sick for a moment, seeing all those clippings concerned Voldemort's attacks and every mention of the number of victims was circled with green ink.

What the hell was that? He thought, disgusted. A hit list? A score of how many lives Regulus and his pals had ended? No, he thought. That didn't make any sense. Keeping a score was something so twisted that, out every Death Eater he knew, he could only picture Bellatrix, Greyback and a small handful of other blood-thirsty creeps keeping one in their bedroom. Regulus simply couldn't have been that far gone, not when he'd ended up stealing a Horcrux to try and block his master's path to victory. Could it be the opposite, then? Sirius wondered. Could it be that, in the end, his brother had regretted his actions so badly that he'd forced himself to wake up every day to face the number of lives he'd helped taking?

"Sirius," he heard his wife saying somewhere behind him.

He turned around to see his wife holding a piece of crumpled parchment as she crunched down by what seemed to be a paper basket near Regulus's old desk.

"I think there's something you should see in here," she said, standing further up and bringing the basket with her to place it on top of the desk.

Confused, Sirius approached her only to be handed the crumpled piece of parchment she'd been holding. Once again, he recognized his brother's handwriting.

_Dear Sirius, _

_We haven't been in contact for many years over your feud with our fam…_

He was unable to read the rest of it as several words were repeatedly crossed out throughout the short three lines Regulus had managed to write, leaving it unfinished and clearly scrapped… His brother had been trying to contact him, Sirius thought. Yet, he'd never received any letters.

"There's more in there," Mia said, nodding the paper basket.

There was more indeed, Sirius noted, looking into it himself. "How can these have lasted this long in a waste basket without being thrown out?"

"When we moved into this house, Kreacher told us that your mother gave orders for no one to touch anything in this room after your brother… after he was gone," Mia explained in a low tone. "It seems that, for her, this was sort of like… a shrine to his memory. Kreacher was never allowed to clean it afterwards and I never came in here myself out of respect, I guess. Your brother must have written this very shortly before he passed."

Sirius nodded, accepting the answer and, taking a deep breath, he removed another ball of crumpled parchment from the basket, spreading it open carefully. First came one, than another, some with more frustrated handwriting, others with a calmer sort.

_Dear Sirius,_

_I am sure you will consider this letter unwelcome after…_

_Dear Sirius,_

_You must find it odd that I'm writing to you after all these years. I need your help…_

_Dear Sirius,_

_You were right…_

_Dear Sirius,_

_I'm sorry…_

He read draft after draft, trying to piece the words together into a reasonable reason for his brother to be trying to contact him. He had his suspicions, though, and was almost certain it concerned the Horcrux Regulus had stolen. Finally, when he reached the last piece of parchment, he found something that sounded coherent at the least – the closest thing to an actual letter, although the fact that it was crossed off too showed Regulus hadn't been satisfied with it either.

_Dear Sirius,_

_I feel you are the only person in the world I can trust enough to discuss this with. _

_For a long time, I've been feeling I have __made a mistake by joining the Dark Lord and now I have found an upsetting truth about his plans, which are much darker than any of us could suspect._

_I cannot tell you of it on this __letter as the risk that it could be intercepted is too great, so I beg you to use any leftover faith you have in me and meet me at…_

The message was left unfinished there, to his frustration. Questions filled his mind, then. Why hadn't he finished it? Why hadn't he sent it? The most troubling of all, though, was the one that came next. Would _he_ have gone in the first place? Would he have trusted his brother enough to accept meeting him? He honestly couldn't answer that without a doubt in his mind. He just couldn't.

"You would have helped him," Mia answered for him seconds later. He looked at her sharply, disbelieving and wondering how on earth she knew what he was thinking. She rolled her eyes for a second, easily spotting his puzzlement and showing him the letter she'd taken from him at some point, during his thoughts. It wasn't a big leap from there into guessing what was going on in his mind.

"I'm not sure of that myself – how can you possibly be?" he asked in return.

"Because sometimes only an outsider can give you answers about yourself," Mia told him. "I'm not saying you'd have leaped into it. You'd probably not accept meeting him right away. But eventually… You wouldn't have just rejected your brother – you're not that sort of person."

He looked at her for several seconds, taking her words in. "Sometimes I wonder if you know me better than myself."

"Maybe I do," she replied, smiling a little. "I'm starting to wish I'd met him, you know? Regulus."

"You did," Sirius replied. "You went to school with him."

Mia shook her head. "Not _this _Regulus," she told him, giving him back the letter, now neatly folded, and then a kiss on the cheek. "You said it yourself."

"I did, didn't I?" he mumbled, huffing and shaking his head. "That bloody idiot went and stole a Horcrux on his own. It's starting to make a whole lot of sense – why Voldemort had him killed. I always wondered what he'd done to get that…"

"He took a stand," Mia said. "And you realize what that means, don't you?"

"He wasn't a complete prick in the end of it, I know…"

Mia shook her head. "No, not that," she told him. "Sirius, _your brother _stole a Horcrux. He stole a Horcrux _and _he lived in this house. It could be here. That Horcrux could be right here, even in this room."

Sirius frowned. "You're saying…" he looked around, trying to spot anything glaringly suspicious. "It's possible we've been living with that thing for _years?_"

"Well, if it were you, wouldn't you want to put it somewhere you knew, somewhere you felt safe in? This might have not been your home back then but, from what you've told me, it certainly was his," Mia stated.

Sirius huffed. "Not a very creative place, though… I suppose I'll give it a try." He reached for his wand, removing it from his pocket, and raised it. "Accio Horcrux," he said, pointing his wand around the room. He waited a second… then another. Nothing happened. Huffing, he lowered it in frustration. "Well, that would have been too easy, wouldn't it?"

"Defenitely," Mia agreed.

"This is going to be like finding a needle in a haystack. This room, not to mention the house, house has about a year's worth of searching and that's assuming Voldemort didn't take it back when he killed Reg… or that the real locket wasn't thrown away when you moved into the house. It's painfully clear you've done a lot of cleaning here…"

"No, if it was in this house, it couldn't have been thrown away," Mia said, though she couldn't be completely sure. "We allowed Kreacher to take everything he felt attached to and put it in the attic – jewelry, clothing… even your mother's portrait."

"Wait, my mother's portrait is still in this house?" Sirius asked in disbelief.

Mia nodded – she supposed she'd forgotten to mention that detail… "We found this large crate to put it in… it has a heavy silent charm on it so it won't bother people down here. Kreacher takes care of it, as far as I know – goes in there, soothes the old mistress… I don't know, he just wanted to keep it. It was hard enough to get him to take it off the wall… eventually, we convinced him that having strangers around would just upset the portrait. And, well, the fact that it kept calling rather unflattering names in the lines of 'bastard' to Izzy, whom he'd gotten rather fond of, helped convincing him it was the best for everyone if his old mistress retired to the attic…"

"It would have been even better if she'd retired to the lit fireplace," Sirius mumbled under his breath.

"Nice try… the portrait was indestructible and permanently stuck to the wall. Just be thankful we had Kreacher to work around it and that you don't have to greet her every day at the entrance hall. But, back to the locket Horcrux, Kreacher adored Regulus, didn't he? He would have never thrown something so important to your brother away. If anything, he…" She paused, her face illuminating itself. "Kreacher would have kept it close. You know what, if anyone here knows where to find that Horcrux, it's…"

Sirius was out the door, stalking his way down the stairs before she could finish her sentence – apparently, her husband hadn't even thought of just summoning the house-elf, heading downstairs to meet him instead.

He reached the living room in a matter of seconds, where the kids had apparently settled in by them. Alex was nowhere to be seen, which lead Sirius to momentarily assume either Mia or one of the kids had taken the boy upstairs to his bed while he'd been hiding in his brother's room.

"Sirius," Harry said, standing up – Regulus's locket in his hand before he dropped it into his pocket – as soon as he saw his godfather at the door. "Are you okay?" he asked, just as his friends joined in with a ton of other questions, some concerning his well-being, others about the Horcrux.

Either way, Sirius ignored them all. "Where's Kreacher?" he simply asked

"Kreacher?" Ginny asked, confused.

"Yes, where is him?"

Harry shrugged. "He left a few minutes ago."

"Something about having to polish the silverware…" Izzy absently provided, her mind rather lost in her earlier… epiphany. Later she'd feel a bit guilty at having drifter through such an important conversation because she'd been so lost with her own stupid issues.

_Dining room,_ Sirius easily guessed from his daughter's remark, already motioning towards the door before Mia grabbed his arm, stopping him. "What?" he asked her.

"_What_? Merlin's beard, Sirius. Stop running frantically all over the house after Kreacher – at the rate you're going, you'll just fall down the stairs and break your neck! Isn't it much easier to just summon him here, where every person of interest in this matter is?" she remarked, raising before her husband had a chance to respond. "_Kreacher_?" she called. "Can you come here?"

The house-elf materialized right opposite the sofa that Harry and Ginny happened to be sharing, a silver platter in one hand and cleaning rag in the other. "Mistress called for Kreacher?"

"Yes, Kreacher, I did," she replied, giving Sirius a look that clearly said 'see how much simpler it can be?'. He shrugged in return, sitting on the arm of the sofa Harry and Ginny shared.

"We need to ask you something," Sirius informed him as the kids remained silent, watching the scene. "About my brother, Regulus."

Kreacher's thin lips pursed, showing a series of wrinkles around them. "Young Master Regulus be gone for a long time," he stated in an almost protective matter, sprinkled with genuine grief. "Young Master's memory should be left alone."

Sirius gave him an angry look. "Don't even think of getting started with the accusations. No one here's planning to trash his memory!"

"Sirius, he's just being protective," Mia told her husband, touching his arm softly, sitting by Harry's side after her godson had made room for her. "I think we should establish, first of all, that we're not trying to accuse anyone of anything here. We just need your help at finding something of his – it's very important, Kreacher."

Kreacher looked at her for a long moment before saying anything. "Kreacher try and help mistress as much as he can."

"Thank you. Now, we're looking for…" she paused and turned to Harry. "Maybe you should describe it yourself – you're the only one of us who's actually seen it before."

Harry nodded, turning to the house-elf. "It's a locket. A heirloom, made of heavy gold with an 'S' branded on it. The 'S' is actually a serpent, by the way. And it's shaped more or less like…" he said, reaching for his pocket and removing the fake locket "… this one."

Kreacher's eyes, already wide-open during the description, managed to open even wider at the sight of the locket. It was about a couple of seconds after he'd first seen it that fat tears started to fall down from those huge eyes and the elf started sobbing uncontrollably.

"Kreacher?" Hermione asked, concerned.

"_Kreacher failed his orders_!" he yelled, his voice much louder than anyone would find possible, bearing in mind his size. And suddenly, before anyone could try to comfort him, Kreacher lifted the silver platter he was still holding and, to everyone's disbelief hit himself on the head with it, very nearly knowing himself out.

"Kreacher!" Hermione yelled.

The whole commotion with Kreacher hitting himself seemed to be enough to make Izzy drift back from her thoughts. "What the hell?" she mumbled. "Kreacher, stop that!" she ordered, narrowly beating her parents and her brother to it. The house-elf froze mid-movement while he tried to strike himself with the silver platter once again.

"Merlin's pants, he's lost it!" Ron yelled in disbelief at what he'd just seen.

"What did we tell you about hitting yourself, Kreacher?" Mia demanded, her face covered with shock as she took the silver patter away from him, absently passing to Harry, who passed it to Ginny, who passed it to Hermione and then to Ron – the latter just sat awkwardly, not sure of what to do with the piece of dinnerware on his lap, ending up shoving it into a basket that sat by the sofa full of old newspapers. "For Merlin's sake, never do that again!" Mia warned the house-elf.

"But Kreacher failed…"

"Failed what?" Sirius demanded. "What orders did you fail? Whose?"

"Young Master Regulus's!" Kreacher said, sobbing. "He… he ask Kreacher to keep the locket safe but… but… it be gone. Slimy thief take it! Kreacher know he did!"

Mia leaned forward, slightly closer to the house-elf. "Kreacher calm down. Tell us: what thief are you talking about? Who took the locket?"

Kreacher sniffed and sobbed some more. "M… Mundungus Fletcher."

"Mundungus Fletcher?" Harry asked, confused. "How did he ever get in here?"

Sirius shook his head… "No idea. I can't rem…" He paused, then, as the memory of it hit him. "The order meeting. We held a meeting here at home. Moody went upstairs to the attic to reset the wards for us – he didn't want to let Fletcher out of his sight so he took him along…"

The house elf made some sort of choking sound like he was repressing an urge to sob some more. "Slimy thief steal Master Regulus's locket and old Mistress's jewellery and the Order of Merlin, first class…" This time, he didn't even try to hide another sniff.

"Are you sure it was him?" Mia asked softly. "That you didn't just put those away somewhere else?"

Kreacher shook his head. "Kreacher never move old masters' precious things – he think they be safe in the attic. But then Mundungus Fletcher came and… they be gone! All gone! Stollen!"

"Merlin, but that was weeks ago!" Sirius said. "Why didn't you say something? No one gets away with stealing stuff from this house – not even your stuff!"

Kreacher looked at him with wide eyes. "Kreacher's?"

Sirius looked away, trying not to make it seem like a big deal "Do I look like I want anything to do with my mother's jewellery? Or some Order of Merlin first class my grandfather won by bribing the ministry with buckets of gold? Anyway, as far I care, that stuff's yours. Still doesn't make it right that some petty thief would come around a steal it!"

"Why didn't you tell us, Kreacher?" Mia repeated the question.

"Kreacher be ashamed!" the house-elf said, sobbing yet another time afterwards. "Kreacher try to find thief but he be gone too. Kreacher can't find him!" He sniffed again. "Kreacher lose forever locket Young Master Regulus die to get! Kreacher fail Young Master!"

There was a moment of silence after that. The air became suddenly heavy.

"_Died _to get?" Sirius asked, breaking the silence. "I thought Voldemort had him killed afterwards…"

Kreacher shook his head several times. "No. No, Young Master never make it out of cave… he… he… he sacrifice himself to get locket. He save Kreacher." He paused and sniffed, then. "A very brave boy, Young Master… Very kind to Kreacher."

Harry cleared his throat and turned to his godparents. "Maybe it would help if he… told us the whole story how Re…" he hesitated, turning to Sirius. "How everything happened… every detail is important."

Sirius nodded, turning to Kreacher. "Tell me what happened to me brother." He paused for a second, then, and spoke again. "Please."

Kreacher eyed his current master strangely – 'please' rarely was in the vocabulary either used around each other. Yet, after a moment he did as requested: he told the story and praised his old master like one would praise a hero… Told them how Voldemort had requested a house-elf to help him hiding the Horcrux, how he'd suffered through the potion and nearly died to assist the dark lord, only having made it home thanks to Regulus's orders. Then, the house elf continued, telling them how worried Regulus had become after having been told of what had happened in the cave and later requested that Kreacher took him back there only to sacrifice himself by taking the potion so Kreacher could switch the Horcrux with the other locket and escape. In the end, the only thing Kreacher had been unable to do was destroying the Horcrux.

"So, the inferi in the lake…" Sirius mumbled, his own depiction of the horrifying scene that had led to his brother's death playing impossibly clearly in his mind. No matter how much he tried to keep his thoughts away from it, it would always come… a dark lake, a cold cave, the dead dragging Regulus into the water…

Kreacher looked down. "Kreacher try to escape with Young Master but wards be too strong… They not allow humans to pass, even with House Elves helping. Kreacher's sorry…"

"It wasn't your fault," Mia jumped in his defence. "You did what you could – no one can blame you." She turned to Sirius pointedly, hoping he would agree.

"He knew what he was signing up for," Sirius mumbled – now, he understood why his brother had ended up not asking for his help. He probably wouldn't have managed to get away from the cave – between the inability to apparate past the Inferi and the certain unwillingness to leave his brother behind, Sirius was nearly certain he would have met his death at that cave… And just as certain his brother had known it too. Kreacher had been the safest bet, the only bet, taking into account that there was nearly no limit for what a house-elf could do through the binding to its master's will. All of a sudden, he wished Regulus had cowered in the end… at least he would have been alive. Merlin, he missed the guy…

"We're going to make sure he didn't die in vain," Harry announced confidently, making Kreacher's eyes fill with hope. "It's my mission now, Kreacher – having that locket destroyed. We just need to get it back now."

Kreacher narrowed his eyes. "Kreacher will help! He won't rest until he find slimy thief for Young Master Harry and get evil locket back!" He climbed onto the coffee table as if to emphasise his point. "Kreacher will help!" Seconds later, the old house-elf blushed (either that was physically possible or not), climbed down from the table and looked down, embarrassed by his own outburst.

Most of the kids chuckled at that while Mia just leaned her head her husband's side as he sat by her side on the arm of her sofa. She looked up at Sirius and saw him looking absently out the window, very thoughtful. She reached for his hand and entwined their fingers, hoping it would comfort even it only a little. Seconds later, he looked down at her and tried to offer a little brave smile. He was going to be alright – she was sure of it…

"You're all so nice to Kreacher," Hermione whispered to Harry as she leaned forward from her own seat, her house-elves-defender's heart genuinely touched. "I just don't understand… why don't you allow him to be a free elf? I'm sure he'd still st…"

"Free Kreacher?" the house elf said, quickly recomposed and looking absolutely terrified by what he's just over heard. "No! Mistress… Master… Kreacher be good. Kreacher will not sleep until he find thief! Please…" he begged, turning to Sirius and Mia in complete terror.

"Calm down – no one's going to free you," Sirius told him, rolling his eyes, trying not to sound too concerned. "You're already part of the house's foundations – it would probably just turn into rubble without you haunting it every day…"

Mia nodded. "We need you around this house, Kreacher. You don't have to worry about being sent away and you _most certainly_ won't get yourself sleep deprived to find Mundungus Fletcher – that's an order, by the way. Now, could you do me a favour and go check keep an eye on Mary? She should be waking up soon…" It soothed him, Mia knew, looking after the children. He positively adored them, especially the youngest ones, with whom she knew he played shamelessly when he thought nobody was around.

Kreacher looked at Mia – and, for a fraction of a second, even at Sirius – with relieved, thankful eyes before nodding obediently. "Kreacher watch little Miss Mary." And, with that, he disappeared with a soft 'pop'.

"I… I don't understand…" Hermione mumbled.

"Sounds pretty clear to me," Ron replied. "He'd go completely mental if they freed him."

"Ron is right, Hermione. He's been here for too long,– his whole life," Mia told her. "The thought of being freed… it's too much for him, even though he could still live with us. I did propose freeing him when we moved in and his reaction… well, it wasn't this bad, but it was still… disconcerting. This is his home as much as it is ours. And I like to believe he sees us as family too… We treat him as a friend…" she turned to Sirius and gave him a disapproving look "…mostly."

Sirius huffed. "Oh, don't look at me like that – you know even _he_ would feel like something was missing if the mutual bickering ceased. We'll never be nice to each other just as the sun will never shine at night – it would be unnatural. I'm pretty sure he feels the same."

Ginny looked at him uncertainly. "Hum, so basically you're just fulfilling the role of each other's adversaries, but you actually… care for each other," she concluded. "I'm tempted to channel Lavender Brown and go 'aw'."

"Low blow," Ron mumbled, swallowing hard at the mention of his ex-girlfriend.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Sirius assured Ginny, trying to seem clueless as he turned to Harry. "Kid, your girlfriend has the wildest imagination."

"I'm sure she does," Harry mumbled, half grinning at his godfather's denial.

Hermione cleared her throat. "So, I think we should address the main issue here, which is, now that we know he stole the real Horcrux from Kreacher, finding Mundungus Fletcher."

"Kreacher seems eager enough to get his hands on him," Ron observed. "Likely choke himmto death with them too…"

"I'm sure he is and I'd be inclined to encourage him if we didn't need answers, but finding the little rascal is bound to be hard," Sirius stated. "I'm not sure if you've heard the news but Fletcher has been under the grid for weeks – apparently, he decided to pull some sort of complex heist and then double-crossed his crew just to run away with everything they stole… He's not only running from the crew itself but also from the aurors."

"Well, at least we're not the only ones looking for him," Izzy mumbled, only half-paying attention. "That's a plus."

"A plus? If the aurors are the first to get their hands on him, he won't be of much use locked up in Azkaban," Harry countered.

"And he'll be of even less use of his crew beats them to him and wipes, well, the life out of him. Literally," Sirius pointed out as his daughter distractedly shrugged, still definitely lost in her thoughts of the earlier events of her afternoon.

Mia nodded. "Yes, but I'm sure that if you ever want to find out where the Horcrux is, the Auror department is always a better bet than an angry crew who got double-crossed… We'll go on investigating on our own and so will Kreacher but I'd say the crew and especially the aurors have better resources and better odds at being successful. And that's not particularly terrible – we can't forget that we have a few friendly connections inside the auror department, who can give us a warning it they get a wind of Mundungus Fletcher's whereabouts…"

"Yes, that's probably a good idea," Sirius agreed. "Maybe Kingsley will go along with it if, you know, you reach him through the right _connections,_" he said, hinting at Mia to talk Elizabeth into convincing (maybe even seduce) her fiancé into helping them. "Tonks will definitely go along. I'll actually bring it up when I see her nex…" Suddenly, thinking of Tonks and, by extension, her significant other reminded him of something. "Crap. How long 'till sunset?"

"Hum?" Ron mumbled, looking confused.

"It's full moon, Ron," Ginny quickly filled him in.

"Oh," he mumbled.

"I'm not sure – not long, I'd say," Harry pointed out, standing up to look out the window. "Yeah, it's nearly dusk."

His godfather nodded. "Alright. So, I need to go. Hold whatever thoughts you has and we'll finish this conversation some other time," he agreed, standing up too and proceeding to say his goodbyes before heading downstairs to the hall, intending to step out of the house and apparate away.

Before reaching the door, though, he stopped at the entrance hall waiting for Mia to reach him as she clearly had something to say.

She gave her husband a concerned look. "Sirius, this was a difficult day for you… finding all this about your brother, learning how he died… If you don't feel up to go, I'm sure Remus will understand… Tonks has been brewing Wolfsbane for him, after all. He can handle the transformation better that way…"

Sirius shook his head, softly wrapping his arms around her waist, pulling her just a little closer. "It's alright, love. Actually, going to assist Moony may be exactly what I need – it will give me plenty of time to… process everything on my own." He reached to press a kiss to her forehead and then forced a smile, trying to convince her he was fine. "Moony says I get rather philosophical in my dog form."

"Don't you play strong with me," Mia warned him. "Just promise me you won't blame yourself again."

He huffed. "I'll try," he offered before capturing her lips softly into a tender 'see you later' kiss. Feeling she didn't really stand a chance at changing his mind, Mia let herself fall into the kiss without hesitation, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling his lips even closer.

Seconds passed before they broke apart and Sirius placed a last kiss on her forehead. "I'll see you in the morning. Try not to miss me too much."

She gave him a little smile. "Always do. And you – try not to over-think things too much," she advised.

He had to chuckle as he headed to the door. "Says the kettle to the pot, my lovely queen of all over-thinkers."

She frowned a little as he closed the door – he might have a point there and, Merlin, did that annoy her…

Turning around, she looked up the stairs and raised an eyebrow when she saw Izzy standing there looking down like she'd just been closely scrutinizing her parents' display of affection. Usually, at being clearly caught watching them, Izzy would have made some sort of mocking remark about public displays of affection, yet, that time, she just stood there and sighed. That had Mia furrowing her brows as she made her way up the stairs, sensing something was going on.

"And what's with you this afternoon?" Mia asked her daughter, approaching her. "You look troubled."

Izzy blushed a little but tried to hide it with a shrug. "I'm just feeling a little distracted today," she lied because she really, really didn't want anyone else obsessing with her over her newfound… fancying situation with George. _Stupid George and his stupid charms, _she thought for the hundredth time that afternoon. _Stupid me!_ "Distracted and dim, apparently," she mumbled.

Mia gave her a suspicious look. "Alright, what happened, sweetheart?"

That wasn't good – Mum knew she was up to something. Odds were she wouldn't leave her alone until she knew what it was… "Somehow, I let Fleur make me one of her bridesmaids." It's wasn't a lie, was it? Just a half-truth to shift her mother's attention from the real issue at hand.

Her mother's face softened immediately. "Honey, that's not a bad thing. Fleur's a bit… enthusiastic, yes… but I'm sure you'll look lovely as a bridesmaid…"

Izzy groaned. "Yeah, so I've been told," she mumbled under her breath before walking away without another word, leaving her mother in the middle of the hallway, looking at her with raised eyebrows.

Something was definitely going on with that girl, Mia concluded… Before she could try to investigate further, though, something – or rather someone – else required her attention.

"Aunt Mia?" she heard Harry calling as he exited the living room, making his way to her. "Do you figure Sirius wants to keep this for himself?" he inquired, showing her the locket.

She gave him a doubtful look. "I don't think so – Sirius was never one for heirlooms. Maybe you should just ask him when he comes back," she told him. "Why, do you need it?"

He shook his head. "I was thinking that maybe we could give it to Kreacher… Regulus would have wanted him to have it as a token to thank him for, well, everything he did."

Mia smiled at him. "I think that's a lovely idea," she agreed. "He deserves it, doesn't he?"

Harry nodded. "He helped a lot today – if it wasn't for everything he told us, we'd have no idea where to even start looking for that Horcrux…"

Yes, they'd taken a step further that day thanks to Sirius's discovery and Kreacher's testimony. Sure, it wasn't a leap – they still had no idea where Mundungus Fletcher was… but a step was a step and, that point, any step forward was welcome.

She simply had to hope the next one would be a larger one or else it would be a long time before they reached the finish line.

**A/N: Well, not much more to say! I hope you have a great Easter full of joy (and chocolate too). If you're wondering about the Izzy/George situation, check the outtake I posted last week. Feedback is welcome! Review!**

**P.S: I finally got my driver's license (third time is the charm!)**


	44. Birthday

**A/N: And, once again, i got sucked into the big black hole that's real life... Sorry for the delay, guys.**

**31 July 1997**

It was little before dawn when Sirius apparated onto the front steps of his house after another night on full-moon duty.

It was a warm summer night, he noted, allowing himself to pause for a few seconds on the doorstep, knowing that area was already covered by the outer layer of the house's wards. A warm night without a cloud on the still-dark sky, no doubt announcing a glorious summer day – that was a first. All summer, with only rare exceptions, had seemed anything but the season in question: constant dark patches of heavy grey clouds, permanent mist and unnatural cold.

One might be tempted to call 'luck' to the fact that Harry would potentially have pleasant weather for his birthday… his godfather called it proverbial instead: the calm before the storm. And, more than likely, carefully planned by the snake-face bastard, just like he was daring Harry to come out and play now that he could use magic freely.

While that thought remained lingering in his head, a sudden movement on the corner of his eye had Sirius turning like an arrow. It was nothing apparently… nothing human, at least, just what seemed to be a temperamental streetlamp at the end of the street having problems remaining on. He looked at it sceptically for a few seconds: he could have sworn it had been a movement and not a light that had called his attention before…

Sirius shook his head seconds later, huffing as he turned to tap his wand on the door's lock so it would open. Merlin, he was letting himself become paranoid, he thought. It was finally hitting him, he concluded as stepped into the house, the fact that his godson would be leaving in the following day or the one after that at best… So, there it was: worry and sleep deprivation – a perfect cocktail for paranoia.

Sighing, Sirius closed the door and hung his cloak. The house was pitch dark and completely silent aside from the sound of his own movements, yet he started climbing up the stairs without bothering to turn the lights on as he practically knew every step he had to take in order to reach his room by heart.

Sometimes, when walking around that house, he could close his eyes and imagine what it had been decades before. A hell-hole carefully designed to look as non-homey as it could possibly be and where one had to think twice before touching any object they didn't know, or else they might end up losing a hand. Just horrifying.

It was strange how that could be the place where some of his worst memories lay and, by far, also the best ones did too… and it pleased him that the latter ones seemed to be outnumbering the others. He was determined to make sure that outnumbering would continue to grow more and more over the years… the last thing he wanted, after all, was for any of his kids to have the same fate as his brother had: being twisted into becoming the bad guy and never having the chance to enjoy the fact that he'd gone back to being the good one in the end. Just the thought of it gave him a pang of anger and sadness.

Sighing, Sirius stopped climbing the stairs when he reached the second floor, making his way to one of the doors instead – the one leading to his godson's room. He cracked it open a few inches and peaked inside to check if Harry was still there – it wasn't that he didn't trust the boy to stay for as long as he'd promised but it didn't hurt to check if he hadn't already left for his quest. He was glad to see that wasn't the case as Harry appeared to still be asleep on his bed, his body comically lying across it instead of along it as he snored softly and mumbled something that sounded a lot like his girlfriend's name… Feeling amused and just a little relieved, Sirius closed the door back again and resumed climbing up to his room.

When he reached it, a thin strip of light escaping through a gap between the curtains ran across the room, ending on the bed, where he spotted not only his wife but also a certain two-year-old who looked remarkably like a younger version of him and his faithful stuffed dog.

"Little usurper," he mumbled under his breath as he carefully sat on the edge of the bed, by little Alex's side – who remained completely oblivious to his father's presence – and reached with his hand to touch Mia's face softly.

She started to stir almost immediately, stretching instinctively before her eyes opened in a series of blinks. She smiled sleepily at him as soon as she saw him. "Hi," she whispered. "You're back…"

"I'm back."

"Is it morning yet?"

"Depends on your definition of 'morning' – it's little before five," he replied softly.

"Hum," she mumbled sleepily. "You came back earlier than I thought you would."

"Clearly. Looks like you've replaced me with another man," Sirius said, trying to sound pouty as he mock-glared at the little boy's sleeping form.

Mia smiled sleepily and reached to place a kiss on top of their son's head. "He's younger than you too," she replied.

"Handsome like his dad, that's what he is," Sirius replied.

"Well, I suppose it's your own fault he ended up in this bed tonight – if you hadn't let him nap all afternoon long, it wouldn't have been such an impossible task to put him to sleep," Mia informed him, softly caressing her sleeping little boy's hair. "My baby is a little rebel like his daddy."

"A little rebel that's going back to his own bed," he said, picking the little boy up, knowing by his sleeping patterns that the odds of him waking up were rather slim. "Daddy needs his side of the bed back," he murmured, turning back to Mia, whose eyes were already closing back again. "Go back to sleep, love. I'll be right back."

"Hum, hum," she mumbled, nodding absently, grabbing his pillow and rolling to her side.

Grinning tiredly, Sirius stood up and crossed the room to the door, his little son obliviously asleep with his head on his father's shoulder and an arm around his always-faithful toy, Pafoo.

Stepping out of the hall and entering his son's room, Sirius made his way to Alex's bed and carefully placed him back on it, pulling the covers over the sleeping little boy. He didn't even stir, Sirius noted with a chuckle – slept like a brick, that one.

For a while, he just stood there, watching his son lay peacefully, his little chest rising a falling rhythmically – so obliviously innocent, he thought. Regulus had been just that way once, before his parents had managed to completely taint his mind with all sorts of prejudice and hate…

He'd had plenty of time that night while minding Moony to think of how someone could have done such a thing to a child of theirs… and he didn't like the outcome of that thinking. Not one bit. He wished he'd followed Mia's advice and not thought too much but, Merlin, watching a rather tame werewolf (thanks to the Wolfsbane potion, which seemed to be the only thing Tonks was great at making for her husband to ingest) that had fallen asleep a couple of hours into his transformation made one either equally sleepy or heavily thoughtful… He hadn't been so lucky to get the first.

The thinking hadn't seemed so bad at first – it gave him a chance to process his brother's good deed, to grieve for his death, to blame his downfall on his parents… he wished he'd stopped there. He should have stopped there. He had a right to hate his parents for turning his brother into a Death Eater, didn't he? For treating him like crap and everything… They were bastards – it had never been possible to deny that. If only he'd stopped there…

But that little voice in the back of his head wouldn't let him. So, he'd kept on thinking. Why were they bastards? How had they become that way? The answer that came didn't please him: they'd been raised that way too, to hate Muggles, to favour pure-bloods. As had his grandparents, great-grandparents… It was a bloody vicious circle from which few had been able to break apart: him, Andromeda, his uncle Alphard… So, as much as he wished he could pin it all on them, every little bit of blame and hate, he had to accept that he couldn't. It went back way longer than them.

And what irked him the most was that part of him was perfectly aware that, if he hadn't been pig-headed enough to want to give hell to his parents at all costs, he could have so easily become just like them. He could have never learned otherwise and then, who knew, fate would have made everything different… The thought made him want to shudder. He'd been stronger than that. That was what mattered.

Turning away from his thoughts, he reached to place a last kiss on his sleep son's hair and, after entering the nursery to check on little Mary only to find her still peacefully settled in the world of dreams, he made his way back into the room, positively craving for a bed after an exhausting day and night.

Changing into night clothing was a lazy task before he made his way to the bed, noting Mia didn't seem to have moved an inch from where she'd been when he'd left… still firmly clutching his pillow as if daring him to come and get it. After a few seconds evaluating the situation, he figured there was no way around getting it without waking her up…

He didn't have to consider that further, though, as Mia's voice filled his ears seconds later, announcing she wasn't actually that much asleep. "Come to bed," she mumbled, her voice muffled against his pillow and her eyes still closed.

"Well, I was just going to – I was just trying to figure out how to rescue my pillow," he said, chuckling lightly.

She opened one eye and managed to give him a defying look. "I'm holding it hostage until you trade yourself for it," she stated firmly.

"Oh, well, if that's the price I have to pay," he replied, lifting the covers. "Let it be."

Mia was faithful to her word when he slipped under the covers and gave his pillow back, resting firmly against his side instead. "So," she asked her face resting against his neck, "how are you doing?"

"You sure you want to talk about that now?" Sirius replied. "I thought you were more asleep than awake."

Mia shook her head. "No, I'm fine. Fine enough to offer a listening ear, at least," she told him. "So, tell me, how did it go? Your thinking concerning the Regulus matter, that is."

He made a groaning sound. "Ask me that again in a few weeks when I've had time to fully digest it," Sirius requested, feeling strangely wakeful as well, lying by his wife's side – just part of the strange effect she still had on him: soothing and energizing at the same time. He'd never get tired of it. "I wish I'd learned about this earlier… that way I wouldn't have thought of him as some weak moron for so long."

Mia gave him a sympathetic look. "Sometimes you're not meant to learn about certain things until it's the right time. We don't have to like it and it certainly doesn't make those things easier to swallow – it even makes it harder sometimes – but it shifts things closer to the way they're meant to become in the end."

She hated fate most of the time – what wasn't there to hate after what it had put her godson through? But she had to admit that it had its own role in putting the world together. She hadn't found out Lulu was her mother until she'd had a baby of her own. Knowing that it had been kept from her for so long had hurt her very much but, had she been told earlier, would she have been able to understand the lengths that a parent was willing to go through just to be part of her child's life? Maybe Sirius hadn't learned about his brother until then for a reason. She really didn't know. The fact was that the slightest change in the past could have transformed everything from then on and, at the rate things were, they couldn't afford wishing for better and ending up with worse…

"Yeah, well, Reg was a good kid. And I'll be damned if, after this whole thing is over, I don't make sure the world knows it. I owe it to him. As for the rest… I'm still trying to figure it out," he declared tiredly.

"I'm sure you won't be the only one. Who's trying to figure things out, I mean," Mia informed him softly. "Now, on to other business, how did Remus do this full moon?"

He sighed, glad she was changing the subject – she understood him too well… "He'll be fine," Sirius declared. "This was a pretty good one, compared to many others… He was lucky to sleep through most of it."

"That's good. I really didn't think you would be back until six or so," she mumbled, nestling her head more comfortably against his shoulder and allowing one of his arms to circle her, "you rarely do when you go to help him."

"Yeah, well, let's just say a certain pink-haired witch showed up just as soon as I sent her a Patronus to tell her that her husband was all bloke again and promptly shooed me away," he let her know before grinning, unable to keep the joke that crossed his mind to himself. "I imagine she plans to take advantage of his weakened state."

"Poor Remus," Mia mumbled, looking up at his face and smiling a little.

"Makes your heart clench, doesn't it? So helpless at that mad woman's mercy…" Sirius said, dramatically clicking his tongue. "But well, at least she can't make him get her any more pregnant than she already is."

"Yes, that would be quite unique," she observed dryly.

Sirius chuckled lightly and kissed the top of her hair. "Great because Moony most certainly doesn't need any more raging hormones than he's already dealing with. Although I suppose that Tonks showing up must mean they've patched things up."

"They were at odds again?" Mia questioned.

"Yeah. Apparently, Moony had the unfortunate idea of encouraging Tonks to go easy on her job due to her 'delicate condition'," he informed her, shaking his head in disapproval. "Not the brightest idea."

"Oh, wouldn't you know?"

He frowned. "I won't even grace that with an answer other than pointing out that I love you as well as our born and unborn children beyond reason. Blame me for being protective."

"Annoyingly so, if I recall it well," Mia reminded him.

"Your memories are awfully exaggerated by the shocking amount of hormones in your blood when they were formed, love," he stated, rolling his eyes. "Pregnant women… just as glorious as they are difficult. Moony's in for a treat with a knocked up auror around – he'll end up quite a lot in the spell damage ward of St. Mungo's. They might as well have a bed with his name on it."

"Now who's exaggerating it?" Mia replied.

"Don't worry, love. It's all worth it," he informed her, kissing her forehead before shifting to a more comfortable position so they were facing each other sideways in bed. "We should have another baby."

Mia's brows shot up. "You honestly want to have yet another child in the middle of the war?"

He shook his head. "Not now. After it's over. There's bound to be a baby boom after the war, love. We'll just be doing out share of work," Sirius pointed out, smiling suggestively.

"Oh, well, if you put it that way, who am I to deny it?"

"Really?" he asked, hopeful.

"No!" she replied. "See this as a 'maybe I'll think of it', not a 'definitely 'yes'. This is definitely not the sort of decision one makes this early in the morning. Anyway, don't you have your hands full already with a nearly two-and-a-half-year-old kid and a six-month infant? Not to mention two teenagers and an aged house-elf."

"First of all, that last one doesn't count in my book. Second of all… love, after making it through a bloody war, I'm sure handling three kids under the age of five would be pretty manageable in comparison," he said, confidently.

"Right. Remember that a few years from now if I do agree to have another child," she pointed out. "You know, one would think four kids were enough. Especially when two of them are pretty close to reaching legal adulthood. Harry's practically of age, Sirius."

"Not 'practically', love. Just of age," Sirius corrected her.

She gave him a puzzled look. "Hum?"

"It's after midnight, love. Remember? It's Harry's birthday. He's officially of age," Sirius informed her.

After hearing that, Mia just lay there quietly for several seconds, her mouth gaping half-open as she looked at her husband, who observed her closely, waiting for an answer. It was Harry's birthday, she thought, suddenly aware of the meaning of it.

She'd known what day it was, of course – she's been making plans for her godson's birthday breakfast for days, after all. And obviously she was aware of what age Harry was turning, as well as what meaning that carried for him and for all of them. But the fact that it was there… it made everything so much more real. "Harry's of age," she whispered, feeling the weight of reality crushing her like a bug. "Merlin, Sirius…" She looked at her husband, feeling her eyes suddenly burn.

"Hey… hey," he said softly, quickly reaching for her and enveloping her form with his arms, holding her protectively against his chest. She held him just as firmly, her body tense from head to toe although she was fighting hard not to start a fit of crying. "It's okay, love," he whispered. "You knew this was coming."

She sniffed. "I know but… he's leaving tomorrow. That is, if he hasn't alre…"

"He's still in his bed," Sirius assured her, easily predicting what she was wondering about. "I checked."

"Oh," she mumbled, a bit relieved.

"He wouldn't sneak out without telling you. You know that, Mia," he said.

"I do but…" she sighed. "It's like time's snuck up on me and suddenly it's the day before the one when he leaves." She let out a breath. "I'm scared, Sirius. I'm really scared. One thing is letting go of your kids so they can build their own future, another is letting them go and risk it altogether. I get more and more scared for Harry every day."

"You don't really have a choice, love. This is a caught-between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place type of situation. You just have to trust the kid – if there's anyone who can beat the odds and kick that snake-faced bastard's arse, it's Harry."

Mia let out a long breath. "Merlin."

He kissed the top of her head in a soothing fashion. "Listen, what you really need to do is to sit down with Harry and talk. In a few hours, you'll go to him to him and give him his present and the two of you will do just that – have an honest talk, mother to son. Just the two of you."

Mia closed her eyes for a second. "I hate this."

"You're not the only one," he assured her, shifting their positions so he could place a kiss on her lips. "But now what you need to do, love, is just to relax and have a few more hours of sleep because, first, freaking out at five in the morning doesn't usually lead to anything good and, second, because I'd really, really like to catch a few hours of sleep before Harry blows his candles."

She let out a breath. "I'm sorry. For a moment there, I forgot you'd actually been up all night. Thanks for listening."

He reached with his hand to caress her face and gave her a grin. "Always," Sirius promised, pulling her just a bit closer to him and drawing lazy circles on her back with his fingertips.

And only after he felt her breathing become slower and her body relaxing further against his, did he let himself drift to sleep too.

* * *

Packing was a bummer, Harry quickly concluded little more than ten minutes after starting to select the things that he should and shouldn't take with him when he left for his quest. The basics were easy to choose, of course: his wand and his clothes. But the rest… should he take his broom with him since it might come handy for transportation? Some of the spell books he'd read over the summer? His leftover potion-ingredients just in case?

He could practically hear Hermione's voice in his head scolding him over leaving that for the last moment. She'd be sort of right, really… he admitted to himself.

While he was rummaging through the pile of stuff he's created on his bed, the door of his room opened as Izzy stepped in unceremoniously, not even bothering to knock.

"Please come on in – no need to knock so hard on the door," he mumbled sarcastically, slightly annoyed.

"Yeah, sure," she mumbled with a shrug. "Happy Birthday, grumpy. You're officially of age - why don't you just use a spell for that?" she asked as she stood at the door clad in pyjamas and hair rather messy, gesturing at the mess of items on his bed.

"You need to choose what to take before using the spell. And, trust me, shoving what I have to take into a bag is the easiest part of the process," he replied.

"Right," she mumbled, covering a yawn with her hand. "Well, anyway, I was just downstairs and there was a letter addressed to you from the ministry," Izzy informed him, reaching for it in the pocket of her pyjamas. "Here, I brought it up for you."

Harry accepted the envelope, frowning. "The ministry, you say?"

"From the minister's own office," Izzy amended. "Kreacher said it was personally handed by her house-elf. Sounds important."

"And I bet you brought it up because you want to hear all about it," he mumbled in return, ripping the envelope open.

"You know me too well," his sister replied carelessly. Also, she'd brought it up to get an excuse to make sure Harry wouldn't show up downstairs while Kreacher was busy preparing his surprise birthday breakfast.

Oblivious to his family's plans, though, Harry unfolded the letter and started reading, first noting that it seemed to be written by Minister Bones herself.

_Dear Mr Potter,_

_First of all, I'd like to wish you a happy birthday and give you my best wishes for your journey through adult life, despite the current circumstances that we are all aware of. _

_The main reason why I am writing to you today is to inform you that Albus Dumbledore left you a number of his possessions in his will._

Harry's eyebrows shot up. Dumbledore had left him something in his will? What could it be? he wondered. Could he have left him something that would help him with the Horcrux hunt? Maybe a map of the Horcruxes he didn't already know about? More pensieve memories?

"What?" Izzy asked, noting how surprised her brother looked. She crossed the room to stand by his side, trying to sneak a peak of the letter. "What does it say?"

"Dumbledore left me something in his will."

"Really? What is it?"

"I don't know – let me finish, Izzy," he replied, resuming his reading.

_I must apologize for not informing you of __it earlier but I'm afraid the Wizengamot took an odd amount of interest in this matter and insisted that I enforce an outdated law barring underage wizards from receiving willed possessions from someone outside of their immediate family until the day they reach adulthood. _

_If it is convenient to you, I would like to hand those items personally to you tomorrow as the Weasleys were so kind to invite me to their oldest son's wedding. __We shall also further discuss this matter in person, it that's alright with you._

_Please let me know if you'd like to make other arrangements._

_I hope you enjoy your day, Mr. Potter._

_Yours Sincerely,_

_Amelia Susan Bones_

_Minister of Magic_

"Stupid Wizengamot must have gotten their sticky fingers all over your stuff," Izzy said, having read the rest by herself. "No wonder. Dad says at least fifty percent of the blokes there are either closeted Death Eaters or best pals with them. If it weren't for Bones, they probably wouldn't have given anything to you."

Harry nodded. "It wouldn't surprise me that much." He'd met Bones a few times in person and, from the first time he's seen her back in his firth year, following the Dementor situation, she'd rubbed him as nice, approachable sort of person, very much unlike Cornelius Fudge. He was glad to see that becoming the Minister of Magic didn't seem to have change that and made a mental note to send Bones with a reply through Kreacher as not even the minister herself seemed to trust owl mail for those matters anymore.

"Any guess about what they left for you?" Izzy asked

"I'm hoping for some sort of map with the Horcruxes marked on it."

"You'd better hope that, if that's the case, it's the sort that doesn't show without a password like the Marauders' Map, or else the Wizengamot will be way ahead of you," she pointed out.

"Yeah," Harry agreed before suddenly recalling something. "Oh, and speaking of the Marauders' Map…" he reached for the pile of stuff on his bed and dug through it, removing the blank piece of parchment both of them knew to be the map and handing it to Izzy "…take it. I told Ginny. I'd leave it behind for both of you – it wouldn't be of much use outside of Hogwarts."

"Thanks," Izzy replied, accepting the map. "I suppose it could come handy every once in a while."

Harry nodded. "And also…" he said, going back to digging into the pile and fetching the two-way mirror that was part of the set that had once been shared between his father and his godfather "… I want you to keep this too. Before you say anything, I won't take it with me and that's final. This thing has proven itself to be the best way to ask for help from within Hogwarts and I want to know that, if there's an attack to the school, you and Ginny will have a way to do it. I'll find some other way to let you know that I'm fine every once in a while. So just take it."

To his surprise, Izzy just shrugged and took the mirror from him. "Alright, if you say so."

He raised his eyebrows. "I somehow imagined you'd put up a fight with this."

"Yeah, well, let's just say it isn't the first time that the matter of you taking the mirror or not with you has crossed my mind. We know you, Harry, so trust me, we've got the communications issue covered."

"What's that supposed to mean? Who's 'we'?" he asked, suspiciously.

"You'll know soon enough. Don't ask questions," she told him.

He didn't look all that willing to comply but Hedwig's complaints for attention from her cage caught his attention. He approached the large cage on the desk by the window and fed her some owl treats he had lying around.

"What are you going to do with her?" Izzy asked him, eyeing the snowy owl. Though Harry was its official owner, it was mostly used by the whole family as they'd never gotten around buying another one.

"I can't take her along – a snowy owl would catch too much attention…" he said, sadly. Hedwig was yet another thing he had to leave behind.

"We'll take care of her for you," Izzy promised.

Harry turned to her and gave her a thankful smile. "Thanks."

"Now can you stop giving your stuff away, temporarily or not? It's freaking me out…" Part of her felt like he was saying goodbye forever. She didn't even want to consider it a possibility.

Before Harry could come up with any sort of reply, a knock sounded on the door, making both of them turn to it just as Mia opened the door and stepped in.

"Sorry, am I interrupting something?" she asked softly.

"No, we were just talking," Izzy replied. "I was actually just about to leave…"

"You should probably go take a shower now and then go wake your father up… Oh, and Lulu and Gabe are downstairs – they're watching tour brother and sister and helping with… breakfast_,_" Mia told her.

Izzy nodded. "Okay, I'll do that," she said, gathering the Marauder's map and the two-way mirror, which she'd placed down at some point, before quickly making an exit.

Not bothering to close the door behind her daughter, Mia remained inside the room, approaching her godson's bed slowly.

"Packing?"

Harry nodded. "Hermione said I need to have everything I want to take ready today. She wants to take it all this afternoon just in case… Don't ask me what she's going to do with it – at this point, I know better than asking her."

"Alright," she said, stepping into the room quietly. "I see choosing what to take and what to leave isn't the easiest of tasks."

"You never know what you're going to need. Hermione's freaking out over what books to take along. You'd think she was planning a reading marathon."

His godmother laughed softly. "She's resourceful – you can't deny that."

"She's Hermione," he simply replied.

Mia sighed, taking a seat on his bed. "So, seventeen… how does it feel to be of age?"

Harry shrugged. "So far not as astounding as I'd imagined," he confessed.

She smiled. "I thought exactly the same thing. Your godfather and I did. Discussing that during our birthday party led to a… certainly interesting turn of events."

Her godson nodded quietly for a moment, spending a few seconds messing with his items before saying what he had to say. "I'm sorry."

Mia looked up, raising her eyebrows. "What for?"

"For… everything. If it weren't for me, you wouldn't have been put through all this mess of me leaving and…"

"No," she said, stopping him. "Don't apologize for that. That is anything but your fault and family… it's our duty to be there for each other. You don't have to apologize in the least, Harry, you hear me? We care because we love you."

"But…"

"No buts, Harry," his godmother said. "Not everything in the world is your fault. We're supposed to worry."

Harry sighed at that and sat down by her side on the bed. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," she replied before reaching with her hand into her pocket and removing what seemed to be a miniature key-ring or something. Fetching her wand too, Mia tapped it onto the little object and made it grow into a larger size until it revealed itself to be a wrapped gift, which she handed to Harry. "Happy Birthday, Harry."

"Er… thanks again," he mumbled, slightly embarrassed at accepting the now larger cube-shaped gift. "You didn't have to."

"Of course we did – it's your birthday. Now, go ahead – open it," Mia encouraged her godson.

"Alright – give me a second," Harry said, struggling to unwrap the coloured paper from around what revealed itself to be some sort of leather box. He furrowed his brows at it until he found an opening to that box too, which he used in order to reveal the presence of a gold watch within. "Wow," he mumbled. "Looks fancy."

"And yet we didn't spend a knut. It used to belong to your father," Mia told Harry, who looked up at her in surprise.

"Really? Where had it been all this time?"

"Surprisingly, still resting in the evidence room at the Auror department," his godmother explained. "Sirius had been wondering for a while where it had ended up and then we guessed James must've been wearing it when…" Her quietness was clear enough at explaining what she meant – when James had died. "The aurors collected most of his and your mother's personal items as evidence and we managed to pull a few strings through Tonks and Kingsley to get them back for you…" she explained. "I know all this may sound a bit morbid but… your father would have wanted to have that. It's been in your family since the late 1700s – it used to be a pocket-watch before your late grandfather had it converted into a wrist watch to be more practical. It's tradition that it passes from Potter to Potter in their seventeenth birthday, so here's to hoping that, one day, you have a chance to pass it down to your own son."

Harry smiled – actually smiled at her –, looked down at the watch for several seconds and turned back to her again. "Thanks for going through the trouble of finding it. It's the greatest gift, Aunt Mia."

She smiled. "It's not just a regular watch, Harry," Mia informed him.

He raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

His godmother sighed. "Well, we took the liberty of taking it to Gabe to have it fixed – he has a hand with that sort of thing – and we ended up asking him to do a little extra something to it. Finding a way for you to communicate safely and discretely with us during your time away was something that's been in our minds all summer and, well, a few weeks ago we figured something out that involved using that watch…"

_This must be what Izzy meant,_ Harry thought to himself, listening to his godmother's explanation. "So what? I talk to the watch and somehow you listen?"

Mia shook her head. "It doesn't quite work that way – I'm not sure there's even a spell for that… This one is actually a charm that works similarly to what we use in the Order to summon members discretely – we call it the 'silent calling'. Anyway, this charm is a bit more complex – I think Gabriel improvised it himself. It doesn't really communicate through words but instead through signals. Put it on – it's easier if I just show you…"

Harry complied, reaching for the shiny gold watch inside the box and slipping it around his wrist with his godmother's help. It felt odd, in a way, to think that his father had been using it when he's been born exactly seventeen years before… "What now?" he asked.

"Roll it around your wrist. Upwards," Mia instructed him.

He did so and immediately felt the gold turn hotter – not burning hot but just enough for him to know it wasn't a random thing. "It got hotter. What does that mean?" he asked.

Mia didn't respond, instead stretching her arm in front of him to show him her own watch. "Touch this one," she instructed.

Harry did and found it also hot at touch. "They're connected," he concluded.

Mia nodded. "They are. When you roll the watch upward around, it will mean you're alright. When you do it downwards, means you need our help – then it will turn very cold."

"And what if I roll it downwards by mistake?"

His godmother shook her head. "You won't. The watch won't go down unless you actually think you need help," Mia explained. "The charm is designed to know that: the watch itself won't roll around your wrist unless you make it roll and it won't go downwards unless you mean it. To avoid any misunderstandings. Gabriel is good at this sort of thing."

"He must be," Harry agreed. To make sure it worked the way she told him it did, he tried to roll it down but the watch simply refused to move, like it was stuck. He gave it an impressed look. "And say one day I need help – how will you know where I am?"

"That's where it works the most like the silent calling – when the watch goes cols, it will let us know of your location. We can tap our wand on the glass and then on a piece of parchment, which automatically write the address in there," Mia explained. "That's the only occasion when it will let us know where you are exactly – when you ask for help. We tested it ourselves… Sirius and I. It took a few days to manage it because we needed for him to actually think he needed my help but one very messy diaper from Mary seemed to do the trick."

Harry couldn't help chuckling at that. "So, who else knows about this?"

"Aside from Gabriel, just me, Sirius and Izzy. Lulu might know too – I'm not sure. But, anyway, it's our birthday gift to you," she told him.

He nodded. "It really is the greatest gift," he told her. "I'll always keep it with me."

"And I'll always keep mine on… or your godfather can keep his. Gabe made it so we can re-route the connection between the two of us," Mia informed him before sighing. "Listen, Harry. I'm not asking for you to spend all the time rolling that watch to let us know you're fine, not even every day but every once in a while… try just to check in with us. Let us know you're alright."

Harry nodded. "I will. Does it… does this work both ways? Is it possible for you to check in with me too?"

Mia shook her head. "The problem with these spells is that they put a lot of… stress on the object they're attached to. A two-sided one would tear that watch apart and could even wear out ahead of time, which would cut off communication altogether – that's why they don't use these charms so broadly…" she said. "I know this may sound hypocritical of mine, but the last thing you should do out there is worrying about us. We can take care of each other and we won't exactly be hiding, so you'll probably hear news from us every once in a while. We'll try to find a way to contact you directly if we need to send you a message… or if we hear news about Mundungus Fletcher's whereabouts."

Once again, Harry nodded, although this time he was silent as he did that.

"So," his godmother started a few seconds later, by the time Harry was already up and had resumed going through his stuff, "you're really going tomorrow?"

"That's the plan," he replied. "After the wedding. But please don't ask me where I'm going after that… the least any of you knows, the better for all of us."

"I know," Mia replied, sighing. "You're really sure you don't want anyone else to help during…"

Harry shook his head. "If it were up to me, I'd go own my own altogether but Ron and Hermione threatened to do it too if I don't take them along… I suppose we're better off as a trio in the end but I can't take anyone else. Please don't ask me that. Knowing they're risking their lives for me is bad enough."

Mia sighed. "You know, it's unbelievable to sit here and know you're officially an adult now. One day when you have children, you'll see just how quickly their growing sneaks up on up. One moment they're learning to crawl, the other they're turning seventeen and flying away from the nest. It feels awfully unreal. Almost as much as it makes you feel proud of them."

Her godson didn't respond at first, struggling to gather his words before finally speaking. "You should feel proud of yourself, not me," he said, feeling a bit embarrassed as he told her that, although he meant every word. "You've always been there since I was a baby, trying to protect me… being a mum. I owe you everything."

"There's no fee for family," she replied, genuinely touched by his words.

"I didn't forget my promise," Harry told her. "If… no, _when _I come back, when this is all over, I'll start calling you 'Mum'."

Mia smiled. "Now I feel like I should meet that promise with one equally meaningful but that one's a bit hard to top. I suppose I'll have to stick with promising to let Kreacher start cleaning your room after you come back. So you won't have to always hide your messes in your school-trunk."

He scratched the back of his head, embarrassed. "You knew that?"

Mia chuckled. "Of course I did. I always know," she replied, smiling.

The two of them turned to the door when the sound of someone clearing their throat came from there and quickly spotted a tired-looking Sirius waiting at the door. "Kid, your presence is hereby requested downstairs."

Harry raised his eyebrows at his godfather. "You look terrible."

"Yeah, well, I was up 'till five babysitting a werewolf," Sirius replied dryly.

"Then why aren't you still asleep in bed?"

He shrugged. "Duty calls. Less asking and more walking, mate."

Harry didn't move an inch, starting to look suspicious. "Hum. So what exactly is requesting my presence downstairs?" he asked Sirius.

"You'll see," Mia promised, responding for her husband. "Just go on, Harry."

He still remained in place. "There's not some big flashy present waiting for me downstairs, is there? Because this watch was the perfect gift. Thanks, Sirius, by the way."

"Don't mention it – your dad would have wanted you to have it," Sirius replied, grinning. "And, answering your question, no, there isn't some big flashy present down there. Though there may be presents involved…"

Mia shot her husband a warning look but was too late. Harry's eyes were already narrowing, even more suspiciously. "It's not some party, right? I clearly remember opposing to parties." When both his godparents refused to answer, instead looking away and pretending to be more interested in checking their nails, he was certain he'd hit the right spot. "Sirius! Aunt Mia!"

"It's not a _party_," his godfather quickly pointed out. "Just a birthday breakfast. Nothing big or anything."

"Big enough for you to wake for it on purpose," Harry stated. "Just who exactly is attending this not so big birthday breakfast."

"Well, the lot of us," Sirius told him.

"Ginny, Ron and Hermione too," Mia added.

"And Lulu and Gabe," her husband finished. "Moony was meant to come but, well, the full moon speaks for itself."

"That makes more than ten people. More than ten people constitute a party," Harry informed them. "You know the last thing in my mind now is going to a party and celebrate. As if the wedding isn't enough…"

"Then don't see it as a party, Harry," Mia told him. "See it as a close group of people who care about you and want to spend some quality time together during not-so-happy times."

"And, also, see it as giving a big 'screw you' to Voldemort's face by pretending he's not even out there for the next few hours," Sirius provided. "Just imagine how pissed off he'd be if he knew Harry Potter was celebrating his birthday instead of giving a damn about him."

"If you don't do it for yourself, Harry, at least do it for the rest of us," Mia requested, knowing he would later regret it if he passed up this opportunity of just being Harry for a while.

Harry eyed his godparents for a few seconds before doing anything. Eventually, though, he just resigned himself. "Fine," he accepted. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt."

"That's the stuff, kid," Sirius said, slipping one arm around his godson's shoulders to guide him out of the room and down the stairs. Before starting walking, he gave his wife a wink, to which she responded with a smile.

As he silently made his way down the stairs with his godparents in a tow, Harry had to recognize in his mind that Sirius had a point: going on with their lives was the biggest insult Voldemort could possibly get…

And, when he stepped in the kitchen and saw the smiles, read the faces and heard a chorus of voices wishing him a Happy Birthday, he'd be damned if he didn't feel just like a normal kid for a while.

**A/N: Alright, next chapter is most definitely the wedding, guys. Once again, sorry for the delay. I can't wait to finish my degree, that's all I can say... I hope you liked the chapter :D I sure liked to write it but by bit... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	45. The Wedding pt 1

**A/N: I've got to say that I had never, ever written a chapter as big as the wedding's. So, what did I do? I split it in two! And what's the size of this half? 20 pages and 10k words. Yeah, I know, I'm insane but I got inspired. So, sorry it took so long but big chapters and short free time lead to this... **

**So, I give you The Wedding pt 1, featuring mostly the kid's POVs. **

******Note: T**here are refferences (though no intentional quoting aside from a sentence Dumbledore's will) from Chapter 7: The Will of Albus Dumbledore of _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows_.  


The day of the wedding started far too early for Izzy, never mind that she'd woken up long past nine in the morning. Basically, any hour would be too early that day as she was definitely not looking forward to it.

Starting with that sparkling golden thing that she was supposed to wear – a golden thing that had already given her far more grief then one would expect in the form of a crush on a certain Weasley brother –, continuing with the fact that she was set to be on the wrong end of Fleur's bridal nerves that day and ending with having to take part on the wedding march, the day was just asking to be a disaster. A very crappy disaster when one added to the equation the fact that Harry would also be leaving for his bloody Horcrux hunt just as soon as Fleur tossed the bouquet.

Looking at the mirror over her dresser only to see a messy-haired, pyjama-clad and annoyed-looking version of herself, she huffed and wished it were possible for her to just stay in bed and sleep through the whole thing. If only…

Still indulging a foul morning mood, she left her bedroom minutes later and only took a moment to see if Harry had already left his room to go downstairs, which seemed to be the case. It was disconcerting how clean his room looked – not like Harry's messy self at all. It gave her an odd feeling that cleaning his room for once was some sort of farewell gift to her mother… She shook her head at that. "Don't be stupid, you moron," she told herself under her breath – now she was seeing farewells in everything. Things just kept getting better. Next thing she'd know, she'd be reading a 'so long, Izzy' in him kindly passing her the butter over breakfast.

Shaking her head, she made her way down the stairs, only pausing to look up when she heard a loud laugh, courtesy of her younger brother Alex, echoing from upstairs followed by her father's voice.

"… _splashing thing was funny at first but it's getting kind of annoying, mate… Holy crap did you just summon the soap?… No, don't throw it at Daddy… ah, come on! Damn it… Mia, get in here! He's summoning stuff!"_ he yelled in a completely despaired tone. "_Help! Kreacher!"_

Listening to that, she was able to forget her bad mood for a moment and felt tempted to go upstairs just to make that better mood it last – watching her father enduring her brother's bath-time was always fun. She changed her mind a few moments later, though, when she realized she might end up on the wrong end of a splash or, worse, that her father might dump the task of finishing Alex's bath, which was always the basic equivalent to a small-scale naval battle, on her. That might not contribute to brightening her day and then there she would be – enduring a foul mood _and_ soaked from head to toe. Still, she couldn't resist poking her father at least just a little. "Hang in there, Daddy!" she yelled up the stairs.

"_Izzy?" _she heard him asking before he poked his head into the well between the flights of stairs. In the background, Kreacher's voice seemed to be attempting to scold Alex, although his giggling didn't really indicate he was listening at all. "You know, I could use a little hand up here."

"Sorry, can't hear you," she lied, pointing at her ears. "You're so far up."

"Yes you can! I'm just a floor above you! Don't think I haven't used that excuse a thousand times," he told her.

"What?" she asked, still pretending not to hear. "Must be the wards or something. They're blocking the sound."

He glared at her. "Yeah, I'll give you the blocking…"

"_What's going on?" _her mother's voice said in the background. "_Dear Merlin, there's water everywhere! Sirius!_"

"Hey, your son did it, not me!" her father replied just as he disappeared from her view upstairs.

"_Oh, Alex!_" Mia's voice said with a loud sigh. "_This is the first signs magic, you know? It drives them a little mad at first because they're not used to it – it's like they're overcharged or something. You should have seen Harry – I thought I'd have to move him to the shed until it was over._"

"_Here's to hoping it's over soon!_" Sirius replied in the background.

"_It usually calms down after a week or so – the bursts of magic and being hyper. But if he's anything like Izzy he'll get tired as easily as he gets buzzed_."

"_Oh, really?_" he said before his head appeared again in Izzy's sight, leaning over the railing. "I'd say she never quite grew out of being a _brat_."

"That makes two of us, Daddy," she responded, grinning up at him with a wicked look in her face.

"Oh, now she can hear! How convenient," her father said, dryly. "Traitor."

"_Izzy_?" Her mother suddenly appeared by her father side, holding a towel-wrapped Alex on her hip. "Shouldn't you get dressed, honey? Fleur could probably use you at the Burrow."

Izzy groaned. "Can't I just show up when it's time for the ceremony? Please?"

"Izzy, you signed up to be a bridesmaid – that means you're supposed to help the bride getting ready," Mia stated.

"Well, the wedding's not until five in the afternoon," she pointed out. "And I only signed up to be a bridesmaid because I went temporarily insane." Which, in her own logic, wasn't a lie at all – after all, she'd have never given in if it wasn't for the shock of finding she… fancied George… in a romantic way… possibly… Damn it!

Sirius cleared his throat. "Well, in normal circumstances, maybe I'd help you come up with an excuse to get you out of this hellish task but right now I only have one thing to say: you're on your own, Izzybel," her father told her, looking at her victoriously just as Alex giggled on his mother's arms like he agreed with his father. "And now, if you excuse me, I'll go take a shower." With that, he disappeared from her sight once again.

"Catch," her little brother said before flinging what seemed to be a yellow rubber duck at her – a gift, she recalled, he'd received from Mr. Weasley, of course. Who else would give away Muggle toys with such excitement?

Alex did have a flawless aim, she had to admit, as she barely had to move in order to catch it, since the rubber duck fell right on her hands.

"Honey, don't throw things at Izzy," her mother scolded him one floor above, making her son grimace.

"It's duck, Mama," Alex told their mother like it justified everything.

"A duck that I'm holding hostage until further notice," Izzy informed the little boy, who gave her a confused look in return. Hostage seemed to be quite the new word for him, she concluded at some point. "You'll get it back if you're a good boy."

Alex frowned. "Mean," he told his mother, pointing at Izzy

"Pest," his sister replied, shooting him an ugly face. He tried to reply in the same manner but was unsuccessful as the face he shot her was actually rather cute.

Mia shook her head and sighed. "Is Harry up?" she finally asked. She'd checked to see if he was still in his room at about four that morning, right after Mary's night feeding and had been pleased to still find him there. Still, it appeared that day she was set to be constantly in a panic that he'd suddenly disappear and head into his quest sooner than he was meant to, even though she knew that him leaving was simply inevitable.

"Yes," her daughter replied. "He's probably having breakfast. I was going down there now."

Mia nodded. "Well, hurry up eating and getting dressed, then. Fleur's waiting for you," she told her daughter before finally walking away with her youngest son in her arms, telling him they were going to check on Mary.

Annoyed at the fact that, at this rate, there was no getting out of bridesmaid duty, Izzy made her way down the stairs, her hands absently fidgeting with her brother's yellow rubber duck.

It was clearly all George's fault – why did he have to be so… nice sometimes? Why couldn't he just be some clown who joked around _all_ the time and didn't have silly girls falling for him all of a sudden? Idiot, she thought. Why did she have to go and fancy a bloke that she could never avoid because their families were so close together? It didn't even make any sense: he was older, way past school girls and was unlike anything she'd ever dated, physically or mentally-wise. A prankster. Merlin, it was like she was dating a clone of her Dad… She shivered. Thinking of that only made it worse as she suddenly recalled that old, completely mental saying about girls always falling for guys like their fathers. That was just weird.

Truth was, she'd been so lost in her thoughts while making her way down that she didn't even notice reaching the stairs that led down to the basement kitchen or the familiar voices coming from it. Voices that, while familiar, didn't quite belong in that house. If she'd stopped just for a moment, maybe she wouldn't have gotten such a shock at entering the kitchen. Think of the devil, she thought, and it shows right up.

"No, you're not seeing double," one of the twins told her, grinning.

"We really do look this much alike, in case you haven't noticed before," the other added.

She remained silent, staring at them in disbelief and then at Harry, who occupied the chair across the table from the twins, which had its back turned to her, although he'd twisted his position on it so he could face her. "What... what are you doing here?"

"Oh, please don't be so welcoming," one of the twins said in a mock-begging tone. "You're making us blush."

Even though she couldn't quite check the freckle trick Ginny had taught her in order to check which twin was which as her eyes couldn't quite focus from the shock of unexpectedly seeing them there, in her kitchen, Izzy was quite sure the last one to speak would be Fred. She wasn't sure why at the moment, though later she would realize that, at some point, she'd learned that Fred's voice was always just a little bit higher that George's and that he always tended to beat his twin to being the first to crack a joke.

"What's with the rubber duck?" George asked her, chuckling.

It took her a few seconds to decode what he'd said and realizing he meant the toy in her hand, the one belonging to her brother. "Oh… Alex tossed it at me," she replied, unsure of what to do next. She actually just stood there… in her pyjamas… and with bed hair still on. Oh, Merlin.

"Are you planning to just stand there?" Harry asked after a few seconds, pulling a chair resting next to his for her to sit on.

"What?" she mumbled at first before coming to her senses. "Oh, right… sorry, I was just… thinking."

"Still a bit slow in the morning?" Fred asked.

"Sure," she mumbled as she sat down and placed the rubber duck on the centre of the table.

"They're here just to bring me the polyjuice for my disguise for the wedding," Harry explained. "You know, Mad-Eye's mental plan to keep me hidden from prying eyes during the wedding."

"Oh," she mumbled, thankful Harry had provided an explanation before she had to ask again. Yet suddenly, she couldn't help frowning and turning to the twins as something occurred to her. "Wait, why would Mad-Eye ever put _you_ in charge of that?"

George stared at her, a mock-offended look on his face. "I don't know, Isabelle, maybe because we're trustworthy members of the Order of the Phoenix?"

"I might have believed that if you'd left the 'trustworthy' part out," she told him, ending up surprising herself.

She'd expected addressing George directly would feel awkward, given her… newfound feelings for him. That was the thing about crushes, wasn't it? One stammered and endlessly embarrassed him or herself around the person in question. Ginny certainly did it around Harry in their first year at school a lot. So how come her reply to George had come out so… naturally? Now that she was there, talking face-to-face with him, it was like there was something about him that made the crush not so… embarrassing. And, Merlin, how that relieved her… Something to scratch off from her list of reasons on why that day was meant to be a disaster.

Both twins gave her appalled looks at what she'd just said. "Isabelle Something Black!" Fred said out loud in a scolding manner.

"Kathleen," she mumbled, getting confused looks from Fred a George in return. "My middle name is Kathleen."

"Oh," Fred mumbled before clearing his throat. "Isabelle Kathleen Black!" he corrected himself before pausing and turning to his twin for a sidebar comment. "I don't know… 'Something' had a better ring to it."

George nodded like he agreed completely. "There _is _something about pronouns in a name…"

"Hilarious," she said dryly, narrowing her eyes. "Just get to the point."

"Relax, Isabelle. We're just saying," George mumbled. "But, anyway, do you really have _that_ little faith in us?"

Harry cleared his throat. "She does have a point – it doesn't seem like Mad-Eye to put two recent members of the Order in charge of," he made quotation signs with his hands, "'such a vital plan', according to him. Especially one involving polyjuice after what happened to him in my fourth year…"

Fred and George looked at each other for a moment before shrugging. "Fine," George said. "We offered to handle the polyjuice part of today's plan since you're supposed to be impersonating a cousin of ours, after all."

"Mad-Eye wasn't all that eager to let us do it but since the Order's already swamped as it is, he ended up giving him after we solemnly swore we wouldn't mess with the polyjuice, which, by the way, he provided himself," Fred said.

"There may or may not have been an unbreakable oath involved in the whole swearing part…" George said under his breath, rolling his eyes.

Both Izzy and Harry stared at them in disbelief.

"An unbreakable oath? Are you mad?" Harry practically shouted. He couldn't believe they'd take an unbreakable oath for him.

Izzy's reaction was just as intense. "You could die, you _moron_. What were you thinking? What if you messed with the potion by accident or something?"

"Relax!" Fred said. "It wasn't an _actual_ unbreakable oath."

"Though we did think it was at the time," George confessed. "It's this thing Mad-Eye uses to test people. Usually if they're willing to literally swear their lives in what they're promising, it tends to be true…"

"How sure are you that he didn't just tell you that so you'd relax about having an unbreakable oath hovering over your heads when, in fact, it's still there?" Harry asked, a bit uncertain. Mad-Eye was know his unorthodox plans after all. And no one would've caught so many Death Eaters in their lives without a dose of trickery.

"I don't know about… 50% sure?" Fred said, turning to George.

"Something like that," he agreed. "But I guess there's only one way we'll know for sure… What do you think?"

Fred shrugged. "Why not?" he responded as the two non-twins at the table looked between them, trying to figure out what they were on about.

"We'll just need to borrow that," George said, reaching to steal the glass of pumpkin juice sitting opposite Harry on the plate.

He raised his eyebrows. "What are you doing?"

"Testing your theory, Potter," Fred replied, reaching into his robes for what seemed to be a small metal hip flask and starting to uncap it. By his side, George seemed ready to pour the pumpkin juice into it.

"Wait, are you mad?" Izzy yelled when she figured out what they were up to. "Stop it! Are you trying to get yourselves killed? Damn it, George, put that glass down now!"

He did. And then, both he and Fred proceeded to burst into a fit of laughter. A big one.

"It's not funny!" she said loudly before elbowing Harry by her side. "Tell them it's not funny!"

"Actually, it sort of is," he replied, fighting hard not to laugh. "That's not the polyjuice, Izzy. I mean, they're mad but not _that _mad that they'd kill themselves for a joke."

"This is… firewhiskey," Fred said between laughs. "Mum…" He paused and took a breath before trying to talk again. "Mum's forbidden booze before the wedding but we figured Bill could use a drink before it to take the edge of, so we're smuggling it for him." He promptly passed her the flask. "Go ahead. Sniff it."

She did. And, Merlin, it was… "You two can be such jerks sometimes," she barked.

"It's just a joke. The real polyjuice is with me," George said, removing a second flask out of his robes and showing it to them.

"Give me that," Izzy said, reaching across the table and unceremoniously stealing the flask from George's hands.

"Hey!" he complained as she passed it to Harry.

"Shut up! I was half-expecting you two to drop dead just as soon as that pumpkin juice hit the flask," she admitted in annoyance.

"Oh, come on! We wouldn't put our arses on the line like that. We'd rather live until we're old and senile," he told her. "Merlin's pants, you'll just believe anything, won't you?"

She glared and pursed her lips together, too annoyed to talk. For a moment, just a little moment, she could almost convince herself that her fancying that bloke was purely something out of her imagination. Almost. He could be such an idiot sometimes. And such a sweet bloke other times. She was doomed.

Harry cleared his throat at that. "Er… maybe it's best if we get back to where we were before this… odd interlude," he suggested.

"Right," Fred agreed. "So… where were we? Ah, yes, we swore to Mad-Eye we wouldn't mess with the polyjuice."

"Which we didn't," George added, sending Izzy a look.

"Then he provided the potion himself and basically we just had to hunt for redheads to steal hair from," Fred explained.

"There may have been a stunt related to a fake barber shop in Glasgow with free haircuts for a day involved," George stated, snorting. "Lee Jordan swears he'll shave his whole head off on of his days – we had him on hair-cutting duty all day. He nearly hacked off some bloke's ear."

"I'm sure the guy who nearly lost his ear would find it funny too," Izzy murmured, half-distracted looking at the yellow rubber duck on the table.

"So, I take it you found a decent disguise for me the middle," Harry said.

Fred groaned. "Oh, we did. We really did."

"It was fate that bloke enter the barber shop," George mumbled, sighing theatrically like he was telling them some sort of love story.

"And how did he look like?" Harry asked, suspicious with their excitement.

"Well, picture Ron in your head," Fred tried to describe. "Now imagine what he'd look like if a Bludger had bashed his face in and he had nose so crooked that he could probably kiss the tip of it if he tried really hard."

"Honestly, the bloke had to have been in some sort of mutilating accident because no one can be born with a nose that crooked," George observed before turning to Fred. "Oh, and remember the leg?" he asked, looking at Harry and Izzy again. "He had a leg like four inches shorter than the other."

While Harry looked at them, appalled, by her side, Izzy simply looked at the two with an eyebrow raised. "You do realize that Mad-Eye wanted Harry disguised because he wanted him to go unnoticed, right? He'll kick your arses if he gets a wind of that description."

"Well, unfortunately, he won't have to because it reached Ginny's ears first," George pointed out.

"Honestly, it's like she has ears all over the Burrow," Fred commented. "It's weird."

His twin rolled his eyes. "I know…"

Harry cleared his throat. "And…?" he asked, hopeful Ginny had solved the problem.

"And she demanded to choose which guy you'd wear as a disguise," George said. "We had, also unfortunately, taken several samples of hair, some pretty average blokes included…"

"Hold up," Izzy interrupted him. "How could you even tell the hair apart? Which belonged to who and everything…"

"Oh, we always took a photo of the bloke before and… well, we'd take one after too but they were usually too pissed off over Lee's haircutting skills by then to let us. In any case, we bagged the hair with a photo in it. Very organized."

"Yes. Our traitor of a brother whose name shall not be mentioned would be proud," Fred mumbled dryly. "In any case…" He reached inside his robes and removed what seemed to be a Muggle polaroid photo from an inside pocket, passing it to Harry. "There you go."

Harry reached for it immediately first and was more than relieved to find a rather average-looking redhead with blue eyes in it. Nothing like the disaster the twins had described. "Oh, thank Merlin," he mumbled.

"Let me see," Izzy said, taking the picture away from him and giving a look at it herself. "Cute."

George huffed in annoyance. "More like boring," he mumbled. "And with really girlish hands, though you can't see them in that picture. Really tiny ones. And I think they were painted with translucent polish and everything," he informed her

His twin nodded in agreement. "Blokes with painted nails… Angie says you should never trust a bloke with perfect nails because they're all jerks."

"Real plunkers," George agreed.

Izzy raised one eyebrow at them, mainly at George. "It appears I'm into jerks," she said, mostly to annoy him, though, at the moment, from that earlier fake polyjuice stunt, she felt like her statement had a dose of truth in it. Yet, that girlish part of her completely drooling over her crush couldn't help wondering for a moment if he was just making the girlish-hands thing up to get her to take back her 'cute' comment. Probably not, she concluded soon enough, calling herself dumb. Why would he even care if she found some picture-bloke even slightly attractive? She'd really just said it to cheer Harry up, anyway… She cleared her throat, then. "You sure you really added _this _bloke's hair to the potion?"

"Of course we did," Fred said immediately.

Harry looked at them, doubtfully… "Really sure?"

"_Completely_ sure," George told him.

"Would you like us to take some veritaserum to confirm it?" Fred offered confidently.

Izzy eyed them both for several seconds only to see they looked awfully sure of themselves. Still, although she had to accept they certainly seemed honest enough when they swore it was the right bloke's hair, something on their voices… or maybe their faces… something told her they were far too okay with Ginny picking the bloke Harry would disguise as for there not to be a trick hidden in their sleeves. At this rate, she really had to trust that, whatever it was, wouldn't risk Harry's disguise.

"You know, there's something to be said about your own girlfriend wanting to choose the way you'll look like not that you'll have to change you're appearance," Fred told Harry. "Maybe it's some sort of hint for you to change your style a little."

Harry frowned. "My…" he paused and grabbed the picture again. "Ginny wouldn't do that."

"I don't know… sometimes you really have to read between the lines," George added. "It's probably the hair – a lot less messier in this bloke."

"Stop trying to mess with his head," Izzy told them. "As if it isn't bad enough he has to go to your brother's wedding in disguise…"

"Oh, and speaking of the wedding," George said, pointing at her. "We have orders from Fleur. You're to report to the Burrow as soon as possible."

"In fact, we're not to go back without you in a tow…"

Izzy let out a strangled sound of annoying that had the twins snorting. For a moment, she'd allowed herself to forget she was going to be a bridesmaid. "Holy…" she mumbled. "Tell her I got ill. Tell her I fell into a coma overnight and won't be waking up until tomorrow."

George raised an eyebrow at her. "I don't think so, Isabelle. If I recall it well, you promised me a dance at the reception. I always collect."

Harry's face look confused. "What? She can't dance."

"That makes two of us," George told him. "At least I won't look stupid alone."

"Always a good strategy," Fred agreed with an approving nod.

"The point is: if I have to go to that wedding in those stupid robes Mom's making us wear, so have you," George let her know.

She groaned painfully and leaned face-down onto the table. "Damn you," she mumbled and not just because he didn't seem interested on helping her get out of the wedding.

"Well, will you come on your own or will we have to drag you behind us?" she heard one of the twins saying before raising her head and seeing it was Fred. "Ginny told us to drag you if we had to. She said you were the one who signed up for this, so you'd better stick to it 'till the end."

"I wouldn't have signed up if it wasn't for a certain someone blocking my exit," she countered, glaring at the person in question.

George smirked at her. "At least you got a pretty dress out of it."

She pursed her lips together and inhaled deeply. Honestly, what annoyed her the most was that him calling the stupid dress 'pretty' had her, once again, mooning over his words of a few days before, comparing the colour of the dress to the colour of her eyes. How pitifully girlish… "How mental is Fleur today?"

"Well, we haven't really seen her yet," Fred said. "Now, as for hearing…"

"She's loud," George provided. "And very French. We've learnt a few curse words and everything. As a friend, I'll advise you not to cross her. As an even better friend, I'll advise you to make a run for it while we pretend not to see it."

"Though that might involve staying in hiding for a few decades until she forgets the whole thing," Fred added.

Izzy groaned and sank further on her chair.

"Hey, at least you'll be wearing your own skin and won't have to down the most disgusting potion in the world every hour," Harry told her.

"LThat does put things into perspective," George honestly commented before turning to Izzy. "So, what will it be? Shall we pretend to get distracted so you can run for it?"

She huffed. Like that was going to solve anything. As Harry had pointed out, there were worse things in the world than being a bridesmaid. "Fine, I'll go," she heard herself saying seconds later as she got up. "Just let me go change upstairs."

"That's the attitude we expect from the child of a Marauder," Fred said. "Take it like a man… or, you know…"

George nodded. "If you get killed in the line of bridesmaid duty, I promise we'll cry for you. Manly."

"If I get killed in the line of bridesmaid duty, I'll haunt you for all eternity," she countered, making her way out. And, just before she started climbing up the stairs, she took a step back to look at the twins again. "And when I make you both cry for your mother, it will be anything but manly."

* * *

The Weasleys did know how to throw a party – Harry had to give them that. Then again, the fact that the only wedding he'd ever been to before had happened in his godparent's dining room might be the reason why he was so impressed.

The binding ceremony had been a tasteful affair with nothing eventual happening aside from the actual binding. Yet, if anyone asked Harry what had been said or done by the bride and groom during it, though, he wouldn't really be able to tell as he'd been too busy watching the only redheaded bridesmaid throughout the whole thing. True, he's seen that golden dress on Izzy when she'd first tried but, Merlin, on Ginny it was just something else… he actually found it hard to describe. He honestly couldn't understand Izzy and Ginny's fuss over their dresses.

Little after five o'clock in the afternoon, Fleur Delacour and Bill Weasley were officially husband and wife, a fact that they were currently celebrating along with their guests inside the large white wedding marquee that stood in the Burrow's garden. If it weren't for the many Order members walking around with their wands at hand's reach, he could almost believe it was a perfectly regular wedding day…

But, despite the celebrating mood all around and his deep wish to find where Ginny had gotten herself into after the binding ceremony, Harry knew that he had more important things to do like, for instance, finding Amelia Bones. He'd spotted her a few times at the ceremony but that had definitely not been the time to just go to her and ask what Dumbledore had left him in his will, after all. Actually, not just what he'd left for him – for Ron and Hermione too, apparently…

Just as he'd received a notice about the will from Bones, his friends had gotten one too, to his and their own surprises… Why, though, was a mystery to all of them. Dumbledore had been fond of all three, of course, but he'd never really been as close to Ron and Hermione as he'd been to Harry, so what on Earth could he have found fitting to will them after his death?

It wasn't that Harry was jealous or anything, not at all, but, as thankful as he was to Dumbledore for all the help and guidance he'd provided over the years, lately he was getting more and more annoyed with his late headmaster's secrecy. Sometimes he even wondered if he knew the man at all – it wasn't until he'd read some eulogy made by an old friend of Dumbledore and an excerpt of Rita Skeeter's sordid take on his biography a few weeks before that Harry had found out about his late headmaster's broken family, his short tumble with world domination thoughts and his friendship with Grinderwald.

"Everyone has things they don't like to share," his godmother had told him when he'd referred that matter to her, shortly after finding out. "If it was vital for you to know, I'm sure he's have told you."

It still bummed him that while Dumbledore had known virtually everything about his life, there had been so little he'd known about his but he liked to believe Mia had been right about what she'd said – if it was so important to him, Dumbledore would have surely told him, right? Maybe that was what the will was all about – telling him and his always faithful partners in adventure exactly what they needed to know for the quest he'd left. And, Merlin, was Harry rooting for that whole map of the Horcruxs thing…

He was leaving for the Horcrux hunt later that day and still had no bloody clue of where to start looking… well, aside from knowing one of the Horcruxes was in Mundungus Fletcher's possession, which was the same as nothing as he hadn't the palest idea of where the little thief was hiding. How was it possible that he'd spent the whole summer getting ready for his mission and still be about as prepared now as he'd been in the beginning of it?

His thoughts vanished just as he spotted Ron making his way through the celebrating crowd, looking around like he was trying to find something or someone. His friend passed right by his side, mumbling something about 'where that git had gotten himself into'. Something in his tone told Harry _he_ was the git in question and Ton must've forgotten what his 'disguise' looked like so, to get his best mate's attention, Harry cleared his throat.

Ron turned around when he heard the sound and his face soon became covered with recognition. "Oh, there you are. I've been looking for you for ages but… somehow I recalled you being shorter."

"Oh, _did_ you?" Harry asked dryly, narrowing his eyes as looked up at Ron. Very much _up._

Fred and George were brilliant bastards – he had to give him them that. Sure, Ginny had insisted on censoring their choices of potential polyjuice disguises but they'd still made sure they'd get their laugh in the end. How, one might ask? By cleverly taking the picture of the bloke Ginny had approved of in a way that wouldn't show said bloke, despite being around the same age as Harry and very much average-looking, was about as tall as a twelve-year-old…

Short to the point of Mia having to make last-minute changes on his dress-robes, he felt like a woodland creature standing next to Ron, who towered over him about two heads' worth. It was ridiculous.

"Hey, it wasn't me who picked the bloke you'd turn into. Just be thankful Fred and George didn't trick Ginny with someone with a tail," Ron pointed out. "I reckon that would be uncomfortable," he mumbled, his tone indicating he was fighting hard not to laugh.

Harry narrowed his eyes at his friend but didn't mutter any sort of scolding, knowing he'd do the same if he was in Ron's shoes. "Anyway, you were looking for me because…"

"Oh, right. It's Bones. She's waiting for you inside the house – Hermione's over there with her for… you know," Ron informed him before whispering the rest. "The will."

Harry nodded. "Did she say anything about what Dumbledore…?"

Ron shook his head. "Nothing."

Unwilling to keep the minister waiting (and to wait himself for much longer), the two friends made their way together to the house, mostly being ignored by the many guests they ran into on the way.

It felt strangely good, not being recognized, Harry thought. That was certainly a new one. If he walked around in Harry Potter's shoes, he would have certainly been stopped at least half a dozen times on his way to the house and stared at like he was the main attraction in a freak show. Barry Weasley, though, was just one of the many Weasleys walking around that day – no one would look at him twice. Despite the height situation, he had to admit part of him wished he could walk around in someone else's shoes all time – people simply didn't value anonymity enough.

Nodding absently at something Ron was telling him about some aunt Muriel, Harry stepped into the house and made his way into the drawing room, where Hermione sat, awkwardly silent as the Minister of Magic sipped some tea on a sofa opposite his friend's.

The woman raised her head when she heard them stepping in, and raised an eyebrow at Harry's disguise, although she was kind enough not to mention his stature when she spoke. "Mr Potter, I take it," she said.

"Er… yes, Minister," he replied, awkwardly.

The woman put her tea down on the coffee table and stood up, approaching Harry. "It's good to see you again. Although I must admit, in this case, 'you' is a relative term," she commented.

Harry felt himself blush. "It was Ma… er, Alastor Moody's plan," he informed her.

Bones nodded. "Yes, he let me know about it," she said. "Alastor is always on the careful side. I hope you won't take it badly if I ask for some confirmation of your identity, though. One can hardly be too cautious these days."

Harry shook his head. "Of course."

"Please remind me of your audience concerning your underage use of magic to fight off Dementors that came after you in the centre of London a couple of years ago."

"Oh, that," he said, surprised Bones would remember it with such detail. "Er… well, I was supposed to have been tried by the Wizengamot but Dumbledore… well, I suppose you could say tricked Fud… er, Minister Fudge into instead having a personal hearing in his office. It was just me, you, Fu… Minister Fudge, Dumbledore and my godparents in there. Fud… er, Minister…"

Bones let out a small laugh at his hesitation. "Mr Potter, please feel free to call my predecessor by whatever name you'd like. I'll admit between the four of us that he doesn't get much love from my part," Bones stated.

Harry pressed his lips together to keep himself from laughing at that. "Right. So, Fudge was very keen to take my wand away and he wouldn't listen to anything I said – you did, though, Minister, and convinced him to let it pass it as a first strike. Is that enough?" he asked.

Bones nodded, sitting down. "Quite enough," she declared as Ron and Harry moved to sit on either side of Hermione. "Now, I imagine that, before we discuss anything, you'll want to know what Dumbledore has left you in his will."

All three gave the older woman a nod and she reached for a small purse resting on the arm of her chair, removing a roll of parchment that seemed to be far too long to fit into it – clearly, she must've placed an expandable charm in it. Spreading the parchment open, Bones started to read Dumbledore's last will and testament.

Ron was the first to get his item – a deluminator. Apparently, it was a unique object of Dumbledore's own design, meant to suck all lights from a room and give them back with a single click. Why he'd left it for Ron, though, none could tell.

Hermione was the second, receiving Dumbledore's copy of 'The Tales of Beedle the Bard'. Why would Dumbledore have left Hermione a children's book, of all books he'd owned? Sure, his friend had already snatched those most closely related to Horcruxes shortly after the Headmaster's death but there ought to be something more useful to give her than a book about _Babbitty Rabbitty and her Cackling Stump, _among many other stories his godmother had read to him and Izzy when they were little.

Then it hit him – could Dumbledore have hidden some sort of code in there? He turned to his bookish friend to see if her expression revealed she'd hit the same conclusion but that didn't seem to be the case as her eyes were welled with tears while Ron, red from head to toe, awkwardly extended his arms to cover her shoulder in a comforting fashion. Watching that, Harry realized that he hadn't quite grasp how much it had touched his friends that Dumbledore had remembered them on his will…

"And now, Mr. Potter, it's your turn," Bones declared, clearing her throat. Just before she started reading, Harry felt his stomach flutter with anticipation. _Please be a guide to the Horcruxes, _he begged. "_To Harry James Potter, I leave the Snitch he caught in his first Quidditch match at Hogwarts, as a reminder of the rewards of perseverance and skill._"

Harry felt his face (or rather the face of the bloke he was impersonating) fall a little at that. _A snitch?_ He thought. _He left me a snitch?_ It wasn't that he didn't appreciate the gesture but it just felt very anticlimactic…

"There you go, Mr. Potter," Bones said, handing him the leather box that he knew to contain the first snitch he's ever caught at an official game.

Harry accepted it and opened the box, letting the snitch extend its wings. Before it could fly away, though, Harry closed the box back, trapping it inside.

"I'm afraid I was unable to give you everything Dumbledore willed to you, Mr Potter," Bones confessed.

Surprised, Harry turned to the minister in a quick movement. "You mean he left me something else?"

Bones nodded. "The sword of Godric Griffindor."

"The sword…" Hermione started. "But where is it, then? It belongs to Harry. It came to him in the Chamber of Secrets when he needed it the most!"

"Yes, I am aware of it. But it was sent back to Hogwarts already, I believe," she said. "I'm very sorry, Mr Potter. The Wizengamot alleged the sword belonged to Hogwarts, not to Dumbledore. Although Minerva McGonagall insisted it was to be given to you if that was Dumbledore's will, the school board wouldn't have it."

"Why not?" Ron asked. "What business has the Wizengamot managing wills, anyway? I thought it was a minor job in the Department of Law Enforcement."

"It is, Mr Weasley," Bones confirmed. "Often left to interns, in fact. But the Wizengamot is the highest power in the department – it can take an interest in any of its tasks and it appears they have done so in this one. Even before I was aware that Dumbledore had left a will, I had a motion on my desk invoking a series of outdated laws – laws I even thought were revoked – to confiscate the possessions willed by him and barring me from letting Mr Potter know about it before your seventeeth birthday." She turned to look straight at Harry, then. "If I may be blunt, it's clear what we have here – the Wizengamot is corrupted. Most of the ministry is. I've been sure of this for months – that is the main reason why I decided to join the Order. I'm the minister of magic and I can't trust my own ministry."

Although none of them was particularly surprised by that, Ron gulped audibly and Hermione tensed by Harry's side. Hearing it from the minister herself a whole other thing…

"When you say it's corrupted," Harry started. "Just how corrupted do you mean?"

"As corrupted a ministry can possibly be without collapsing which," Bones replied. "You-Know-Who has, no doubt, ears in every department. And the problem isn't just those who are willingly faithful to him. Every day, we make sweeps for imperiused workers and find a number of people infected by the curse. Lately, not so many have been reported, which makes me suspect even some of the sweepers may be imperiused not to reveal who else is. It's epidemic, Mr Potter. And only a matter of time before the ministry itself becomes he-who-must-not-be-named's most useful puppet."

It was much worse than Harry had imagined and, if he had any doubt about leaving that day to start his quest for the Horcruxes, it vanished immediately, no matter how ready he felt.

Bones sighed on her seat. "I must apologize once again for not being able to give you everything Dumbledore willed," she told Harry before standing up. "Well, I won't keep you longer, Mr Potter. I imagine you'll want to enjoy the rest of the wedding…"

"Wait!" Harry said, a bit sharply. "I'm sorry, I meant…" he muttered, embarrassedly. "You're not going to ask us why Dumbledore left us these things?" Harry asked, surprised.

The minister shook her head. "The wizengamot has certainly encouraged me to do so," the older woman confessed. "However, I'm aware that it is actually neither my business nor theirs. And, judging by your looks of surprise when you got each of those items and by what I knew of Albus, you are as puzzled by your inheritance as I am."

She was right, Harry thought. Completely right.

"Oh," Bones said, hesitating just as she was about to step out of the room. "And good luck, Mr. Potter. All three of you, really," she told them, like she just knew exactly what they were going to do right after the wedding.

Just as the minister stepped out of the room, Hermione sighed, like she was relieved. "Finally a politician that doesn't run away from the truth like the devil from a church," she said.

The three of them spent several more minutes in the room, discussing between themselves what their inheritances might mean. They ended the discussion knowing little more than they did before starting it. _I open at the close_. The cryptic message the snitch hid, revealed after Hermione had pointed out snitches always remembered their first touch, which had led Harry to kiss it since he's nearly swallowed it in his first game, seemed to be the only new thing that the inheritance had provided… The problem was, that was yet another thing they didn't know what meant.

To avoid raising suspicions about them forming a trio, while Ron and Hermione immediately returned to the wedding marquee to rejoin the celebration, Harry stayed behind at the Burrow a little longer, following them a few minutes later. However, before he could step back into the large tent as well, something made him stop. Or rather someone.

"Cousin Barry, lovely to see you," his girlfriend's familiar voice asked him as she made her way to stand by his side. A vision draped in that golden dress of hers, he though for the umpteenth time that day, ignoring how pitifully lame that must sound. He felt tempted to just walk up to her and kiss her but then remembered he was supposed to be one of her cousins, which would make the kissing part very gruesome for any onlooker… not to mention that, for some reason, imagining Ginny kissing him with some other bloke's face on made him kind of jealous. "How's cousin Mildred?" she jokingly asked I hope she's recovering well from her bout of Dragon Pox…"

He raised an eyebrow at her. "No one's listening, you know? There's no need to pretend I'm this Barry bloke."

She pretended to be confused. "Pretend? I'm just concerned over cousin Mildred's well-being… You sound a bit delirious, cousin Barry. Maybe you caught the pox from her too…" She reached for him with her hand, trying to feel his forehead.

He gave her an exasperated look. "There really is no doubt you and the twins are all flour from the same sac…"

Ginny groaned at that comment. "Oh, do not connect me to those two in _any way,_" she said, an annoyed look on her face as she eyed her boyfriend's disguised form from head to toe. She shook her head, then, and huffed. "I can't believe I let them trick me! I should have guessed it was a trap when they gave me a handful of headshots of blokes looking like they belonged in a zoo and only a couple with decent ones. Merlin, you're shorter than me!"

"I am aware of that," Harry mumbled through his teeth, looking away in frustration as they started to stroll together by the marquee.

"I was sure they would try to mess with me somehow for making them let me pick your disguise but I thought they'd just use hair from the bloke that looked just like a hog in the potion," she pointed out.

Harry looked at her in disbelief. "Because that would have been so much better than being short," he replied sarcastically.

"No, that would have been cheap, obvious pranking," she informed him casually. "_This _is carefully-plotted pranking. You've got to respect them for that. _Damn_ them."

He looked at his girlfriend, confused. "So, let me get this straight, you respect them for making me a short bloke."

"No, I respect them for being bloody pranking geniuses," she corrected him. "You being on the wrong end of that prank is a completely different matter, which, obviously, will require payback at some point."

"So I take it that what they said about your insistence to choose my disguise actually being a hint for what you wanted me to look like was bogus," he guessed.

Ginny rolled her eyes. "What gave that away? Me dating you instead of the ten-year-old-sized redheaded bloke whose hair Fred and George used to brew your potion? The twins are always trying to mess with everyone – I love you for you being you. You know that."

Harry grinned. It occurred to him that he was going to miss that during his quest: the banter, the friendship, the romance… but, most of all, he was going to miss Ginny. He wouldn't even allow himself to wonder what he'd do with himself if the Horcrux hunt turned out to last for years… He wasn't even sure if he preferred a scenario where she'd keep her word and join him just as soon as she turned seventeen, therefore insanely risking her life every day she spent with him, or another (very unlikely) scenario where she'd change her mind, leading them to spend years apart.

He shook his head and looked at her to see she'd gotten distracted as well, looking away thoughtfully. He wondered if she was thinking the same as him – about him leaving later that day. She hadn't said a word about it yet – part of him had wondered if she'd have last-minute jitters that day that would end her always-supportive attitude towards his mission and beg him to stay. He deeply wished she wouldn't – it would make it insanely harder for him to leave.

Just as Ginny was about to say something after spotting him observing her, they suddenly heard voices approaching from one of the marquee's entrances. At that, she immediately cleared her throat and turned to him. "So, cousin Barn… I mean, Barry. You still haven't told me how aunt Mildred is actually doing… with the Dragon Pox."

Her raised his eyebrows at her but his girlfriend gave him a look that clearly said 'just go along with it', nodding at the direction from where the voices were coming. "Er… she's still very itchy," he replied, not sounding natural at all as he spoke.

Ginny widened eyes, urging him to do a better job. "All green and scaled too, isn't it?"

"Green and what now?"

Before Ginny could respond, a group of blonde girls that Harry recognized as Fleur's part-Veela cousins exited the marquee, giggling and talking among themselves in quick melodic French. When the girls saw them standing there, they stopped walking and only one spoke. "Zee toilettes?"

"What?" Ginny asked. "Oh, the loo? In the house. Third door on the left."

"Zank you," the blonde girl pleasantly replied, shooting Harry an intense look.

Dumbly, he followed the girl with his eyes, gulping heavily before Ginny punched him on the arm. "Oi!" she warned.

"Ouch! Sorry, it's their charms… I was fighting them off, I swear," he told her, embarrassed.

She raised an eyebrow and left him hanging for a few seconds before saying anything. "Alright. I suppose I'll let this one slide," she replied. "But don't go falling for some Veela when I'm not around to punch some sense in to you. In fact, remind me to ask Hermione to do it for me when you're off on your hunt, just in case."

He looked down, tense at her mention of him leaving. There it was – she'd acknowledged it.

Ginny sighed. "I've just burst the bubble, didn't I?" she asked.

"The what?"

"The bubble. You know, the one I've created today to unrealistically protect us from reality and the need to acknowledge the fact that you're leaving for a…" she pause, clearing her throat as she looked around to see if anyone was listening"… madly dangerous mission today. You didn't think I'd forgotten, did you, Har… Barry?"

"Would it be very bad if I said part of me was hoping you would?"

She huffed and crossed her arms. "I hope not. Because part of me really wished the same," she mumbled before noticing her words had gotten an odd look on Harry's face. "Oh, don't even start, Pot… I mean, _Weasley_," she corrected herself, frowning at how odd the name sounded on him. "I'm not saying I _didn't _want to know. I'm just saying that I wish I'd forgotten you were leaving at least for a little while so it wouldn't ruin this day for us too. Wouldn't want you to waste the extra day you stayed for me too…"

Harry raised his eyebrows. "That's not very fair to you, is it?" he asked, confusing her. "I mean, according to you, staying this extra day was my early birthday gift to you? Shouldn't I be the one worrying about making it great?"

Ginny shrugged. "Planning was never one of your strengths," she offered. "Either you're more or less than five feet tall," she tried to joke

He narrowed his eyes. "You just had to mention it again, didn't you?"

"It's too easy," she replied.

"Don't you think I know? In the first fifteen minutes I spent in this… form, Sirius cracked enough short-person jokes and puns to fill in a book. I'm pretty sure he even made up a few… he was on a roll. At this point, it's just beating a dead hippogriff."

Knowing Ginny, he was expecting yet another joke in response. Nevertheless, it never came as she appeared to be staring at something on his face. "What?" he asked, rubbing the back of his hand against his own face, expecting there to be a smudge. "Do I have something on my face? What is it?"

"Your eyes. They're changing back. They're not blue anymore – they're green," she pointed out.

"What?" he asked, alarmed before checking the watch his godparents had given him for his birthday. "Blimey, I was supposed to have taken another dose of polyjuice potion ten minutes ago." He started reaching for the hip flask containing the polyjuice but was stopped by his girlfriend, who grabbed him by the wrist.

"Oh, no you're not. Follow me," Ginny told him, turning on her heel and dragging him behind her as she walked away.

"Ginny, I have to take it or else the disguise will be ruined," Harry protested. It was frustrating how, given his size and his current position, he felt like a naughty kid being dragged to a time out by a parent. "Where are you taking me?"

"To somewhere where your disguise won't be ruined," she replied as she made her way farther and farther away from the wedding marquee.

It was only several seconds later that he realized where she was headed. Her father's shed. It was empty when they got there, which was a relief because, by the time he entered it, Harry's dreadful eyesight was back, which led him to believe the polyjuice must've completely worn off by then. After fetching his glasses from his pocket, his reflection on the dead screen of a broken Muggle telly Mr Weasley had lying around confirmed he was right: his face was back to its usual features and (thank Merlin!) he could once again tower over his girlfriend.

"I bet right now you don't take having to literally look down at me for granted," Ginny pointed out, smiling.

Although he wouldn't say it out loud, it indeed was a huge relief not feeling like a dwarf compared to her. "I take it you didn't drag me all the way here just so I could do that."

She shook her head. "I dragged you all the way here because, as much as I'm all for inner beauty and stuff, just spending time with you while you don't look like yourself and are impersonating some fake cousin of mine is not the way I want to send you off," she explained. "And, more importantly, I was hoping we could snog."

"Were you?" he asked, dryly.

"It's my birthday," she pointed out.

"No, it isn't. Not for another… ten days," Harry informed her.

"It's my early birthday present, then," she corrected herself. "Are you honestly trying to argue on why I should snog you today, Harry?"

He just grinned wordlessly in return and leaned back against the shed's door.

Before she could take a step towards him, for some reason, the smile he gave her then made something click within Ginny. Made her realize how much it would hurt knowing he was out somewhere, risking his life every day, while she stayed behind, wondering if he was alright. From that moment on, she just wanted to drop that brave mask that she'd been using for the past few weeks. She wanted to cry and to beg for him to stay. She wanted to be that selfish sort of girlfriend that would guilt Harry into changing his mind. She wanted to be weak for a moment.

Still, she didn't. It took every bit of strength she had but she knew she'd hate herself if she gave in.

Instead, she silently took a few steps forward and wrapped her arms around Harry so hard that part of her wondered if she wasn't choking the life out of him. But he didn't complain. He just hugged her back.

It was then, he thought. She'd ask him the dreaded request and Merlin helped him if now he wasn't unsure if he'd be able to refuse.

She kept holding him close but refused to cry. She couldn't let him see her crying – it wouldn't be fair to him. Instead she just closed her eyes very hard and swallowed every strangled sound that wanted to come out. She didn't dare to speak until she was sure her voice would come out relatively normal. "Don't you dare die on that hunt of yours," she told him. "Don't you _dare_, Potter."

"I'll try very hard not to," he promised. "I really will."

"Good," she mumbled in return.

Harry only held her closer, letting his nostrils fill with her flowery scent of her hair. "I'm sorry, Gin," he mumbled.

"Shut up," she replied, not wanting to hear him blaming himself one more time.

He ignored her, though. "I'm so sorry I have to put you through all…" He wasn't able to finish that sentence as Ginny's lips crashed into his own, making it impossible for him to speak. Later, Harry would have to admit that he hadn't really bothered to fight her back as the feeling of her kissing him was just too perfect for him to care about apologies.

"I'd told you to shut up," Ginny later said very slowly when their lips came apart. "You apologizing for something you didn't even sign up for makes it sound like a goodbye. And this is not a 'goodbye'."

"Not a goodbye," he repeated, part of him fearing the fact that it might just be.

"I mean it, Harry," she said, poking him on the chest, determined. "You have to come back so we get to be a normal couple for once, grow boring and completely sick of each other before any of us had to attend the other's funeral. So sick, in fact, that one of us will probably be the one who kills the other in the end."

Harry had to laugh. "Well, that _is _something to look forward to."

"One of many things," she assured him before grabbing him by the lapels of his robes and pulling him into another kiss. One unlike any other she'd given him before. It was like she was daring him to try and live without that just so she could prove that he wouldn't be able to, Harry thought.

And, somehow, despite the circumstances, it felt like the farthest goodbye. They were going to make it – they had to.

**A/N: I hope you liked this half. The rest will be in the next one, reception included, mostly from Sirius and Mia's eyes. ****Posting it won't take as long as this one as it's almost finished... I only need to add a few scenes that came to me at the last minute and edit the whole thing. **Feedback is welcome! Review!


	46. The Wedding pt 2

**A/N: After much rewriting, editing and thinking, what was supposed to be a Sirius/Mia centered chapter became what appears to be a multi-character one. Blame it on inspiration... So, here I give you an 11k word chapter that's 22 pages long... enjoy!**

"This is nice," Sirius mumbled, sitting by his wife's side at one of the tables inside the wedding marquee and handing her a drink he's just fetched from the nearest drinks table. "How long has it been since we've been to a wedding? It has to have been an awfully long way back…"

Looking away from the celebrating crowd, Mia turned slowly to her husband, one of her eyebrows pointedly raised as she placed her glass on the table. "I don't know, Sirius… Maybe about… three years ago? Featuring the two of us as the bride and groom?" she replied dryly.

Her husband rolled his eyes in return and took a sip from his glass of butterbeer. "Alright, before this becomes an issue, I should point out that I actually meant _someone else_'s wedding, not our own which, by the way, took place in 19 June 1994 around noon, a date I cherish every day I wake up next to my beloved wife and prized mother of my children."

That time, it was Mia's turn to roll her eyes. "Good save. Now quit sucking up – you've passed the test."

"With flying colours," he replied, grinning before he reached to place a kiss on her lips. "But, really, what I meant is that it's been a really, really long time since we've been to an actual wedding that wasn't our own. Right around since…"

"… Lily and James got married," Mia finished for him. "That's right. We haven't been to a wedding since before Harry was born." She reached back for her glass and took a sip from it. "Merlin…"

Sirius huffed. "Pitiful, isn't it? And you know whose fault it is? Moony's."

Mia furrowed her brows as put the glass back on the table. "Remus's fault, you say," she mumbled, looking across the room to where their friend was standing, talking to Remus. "You might want to explain that thought."

"Well, isn't it obvious? It's Moony's fault for being all difficult about tying the knot. I mean, he basically made Tonks drag him straight to the altar when he finally went along with it so he wouldn't have time change his mind in the meanwhile," he explained carelessly. "And what did that lead to? Us not being there and therefore extending our wedding hiatus just a little further. Therefore: Moony's fault."

"Oh, lay off him, Sirius. At least he did make you his honorary best man. He's happy now, that's what matters," she pointed out.

Her husband sighed. "I suppose you're right. But _still_, I owe him a stag party. One of these days…"

Mia rolled her eyes. "Only you could think of _that_ in the middle of a war."

"Well, it's not like I'm planning to do it in mid-battle or anything, love. In fact, I'll probably leave it for after the war… provided that doesn't take too long." _And that we all live through it. _

"Giving a stag party to a married bloke who'll probably have a baby by then seems a bit absurd, if you asked me," she commented.

"Exactly. That's why he'll never see it coming," Sirius announced victoriously. "Now that I think of it, I never did get my stag party either."

His wife chuckled. "I wouldn't keep my hopes up on him giving you one of those," she pointed out.

"Guess will have to share his, then," he mumbled, looking thoughtful, as though he was already plotting it.

Good old Sirius, she thought. Between mad plans, endless jokes, constant randiness and unbelievable tenderness, she kept falling for him every day. And, if the universe had the decency of being kind to them, that would never change. She desperately wanted it to not ever change.

Sighing at the thought, Mia looked away, her eyes landing on the crowd that had gathered around Bill and Fleur in the centre of the marquee. The couple danced and laughed, likely for the hundredth time that afternoon… they seemed unbelievably happy, she thought. Young and in love… and, at the moment, even oblivious to the dark cloud of war hovering over their heads.

When she spotted Izzy at the main table (looking like she wanted to be anywhere but there as a very old woman Mia recognized as Moly's auntie Muriel preached by her side, constantly sipping on champagne), Mia's motherly instinct had her scanning the rest of the marquee for the rest of her children.

After Izzy, spotting Alex and Mary wasn't very hard, the first sitting sleepily on Gabriel's lap at a table across the room and the latter on Molly Weasley's arms as she stood by her newly married son, likely trying to use the baby to encourage Bill to start working on making her some grandbabies. Harry's alter-ego Barry, however, was nowhere to be seen.

True, she'd only first seen her godson in that form a few hours before but his embarrassingly short height was bound to give him away in the midst of all the redheads… On the other hand, it could also cause him to be easily hidden by the crowd.

"Where's Harry?" she asked her husband, checking if he had better luck at spotting Harry than she did.

Sirius shrugged. "Last I saw of him, he was heading out with Ron."

With that in her mind, Mia glanced the tent only to spot Ron standing by one of the tables with the twins and Hermione. She was disappointed, however, to see that there was no sign of her disguised godson among them. "Well, apparently he hasn't come back with him."

"Maybe he went to the loo or something," Sirius suggested.

Swallowing hard, Mia felt a lump forming in her throat. "You don't think there's a chance he's already…"

Her husband immediately shook his head. "He wouldn't go without Ron and Hermione. Not when he's promised he'd take them along," Sirius replied. "And he wouldn't go without saying anything to us either."

She pursed her lips anxiously. "I don't know Sirius…"

"Don't fret over him, love," he said, making another quick scan around the tent. "Look, Ginny's nowhere to be seen either, as far as I can tell," he informed his wife. "How much would you bet they're both outside enjoying some time alone?"

Mia was silent for a moment. "Oh," she mumbled before motioning to stand up. "Maybe we should just go outside and check…"

Sirius stood up too but caught her arm before she could run outside after their godson. "Relax, Mia. The wards are still up and no one can get in or out of them today unless someone from the Order who's in charge of thet lets them and we both know they wouldn't. If he really is with Ginny, we need to give'em a little time, love. You're not the only one who'll have to handle a goodbye today," he said.

She just stood there, silent for a long moment. He was right. It hasn't really occurred to her before but Ginny would have to say goodbye to Harry too. Mia sighed, then, leaning against the back of her chair. Thinking of that took her back… back to when she'd had to say goodbye to Sirius for her own protection, having no prospect of when she'd see him again. And she hadn't, for a long time – only more than a decade later had they been reunited… It made her shiver – the thought that Harry could be gone for so long too. It scared her that he was so close to leaving and even then she worried about him constantly like he was a little boy. The conflicting feelings between wanting to be supportive and wanting to be protective were overwhelming and she didn't even allow herself to imagine how much him being away risking his life would drive her into madness…

"Hey, whatever you're thinking, stop. It's upsetting you," Sirius told her, no hint of joking in his voice before he made her wrap one arm around his own and started strolling towards the marquee's exit, hoping a walk would calm her down. "Listen, the kid is fine – he's probably just inside the house or something fooling around his 'secret' girlfriend like any seventeen-year-old should. If we don't spot him in, say… twenty minutes, I'll go search for Harry myself. That's a promise."

Mia sighed at that, leaning her head against her husband's shoulder as they stepped outside, under the rose-coloured sunset sky. "It just shows how messed up the world is when I'm relieved one of my kids is probably _fooling around_ with his girlfriend somewhere …" she said, trying to put a bit of humour into the whole thing, if anything, to convince herself to cheer up at least for the moment.

Her husband chuckled at that. "It's not like we didn't do the same at their age," he pointed out, reaching down just enough so he could place a little kiss on her lips. "Now relax, love. Have I told you how lovely you look, all dressed up for the wedding?" he asked, charmingly making his wife take a little twirl.

She smiled and glanced down at the very simple midnight blue robes she was wearing. "You have, yes."

"Good. Because you do look lovely," he repeated before tugging her against the large tent's semi-solid wall, trapping her there before he kissed the corner of her mouth that time.

"I know what you're doing," Mia stated, breathing shallowly as she felt him place a kiss very close to her neck at the same time she kept an eye out for people possibly watching them. "You're trying to distract me. In public."

"We're outside – it would only be public if I started snogging you inside the tent," he told her, his lips making their way back to the corner of her mouth. "And someone does run into us, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm just a bloke kissing his wife," he said just as his lips were very close to landing fully on hers again. "Tastefully," he whispered before finally kissing him.

Later she'd think that he'd done it again: he'd managed to distract her from reality… or rather to seduce her into distraction. But, at the moment, she didn't really care about being defeated as her lips were too busy parting to welcome him. It was a rare moment of peace and she meant to enjoy it. She felt herself grabbing the collar of his robes to pull him just a bit closer and was sure they'd end up giving anyone who saw them a show, the way things were headed. That was so not the time for a show… she thought for a little moment of hesitation before discarding that idea and just going back to kiss him.

"Oh, please, save it for the bedroom," they heard someone saying in a bored tone before breaking apart with a jump. Lulu, they quickly guessed. "I know this is a wedding with all the romance and nostalgia attached to it but, Merlin, at least try to hide behind a tree or something."

Sirius groaned. "Merlin, what is it with you and constantly interrupting us when we're kissing or…?"

"…shagging?" Lulu provided easily.

"Yes," Sirius replied while his wife looked at her mother, horrified, by his side. "Do you keep a score or something. One point if you catch us snogging, double if you catch us sha…"

Mia cleared her throat loudly, slapping her husband's shoulder so he'd get out of her way. "Sirius, will you not use the words snogging or shagging around my mother? And Lulu, will you, for Merlin's sake, not enable him to?" she requested, smoothing the front of her robes, exasperated.

Lulu shrugged. "It's not like I don't know what you're up to… Clearly your kids didn't come into the world in a cabbage patch. But, anyway, let's pretend they did. I just came here to tell you that I think I'll get going now."

"Go? You've barely been here at all," Mia replied before narrowing her eyes. "What's wrong?"

Lulu shrugged. "Nothing's wrong. Alex and Mary are getting tired and, since I'm on babysitting duty for the rest of the day, I should take them home," the older woman said.

Mia raised her eyebrows at her. Her mother's carelessly natural expression might have fooled anyone else, but not her. "And…" she urged Lulu.

"And nothing." When her daughter just kept staring at her, Lulu just huffed and gave up. "What are you staring at, Mia?"

Sirius snorted. "Wow. She's got _that _face on," he told his mother-in-law. "The one she always wears when she's sure one of the kids has done something they shouldn't."

"I'm not one of your kids," Lulu protested.

"No, you're my mother," Mia said. "And I know for a fact you love a good party and could easily ask Molly to let you put the kids down at one of the rooms in the house. So, why do you want to go away now?"

Lulu groaned. Mia not only knew her too well but she also was too perceptive. "Fine. I don't want Gabe to get ideas."

"What sort of ideas, exactly?" Sirius asked his mother-in-law.

Lulu glared at him for asking but ended up shrugging when she realized it was basically impossible for that question not to be asked. "Ideas to propose. Again."

"_Again_?" Mia asked in disbelief. "Wait he's done it before?"

"A couple of times," her mother replied.

"And you said 'no'?" Sirius inquired, frowning. "Ouch, that's got to hurt."

Lulu huffed. "It's not like _that_. He didn't propose _propose_ on one knee and stuff. He just told me that sooner or later I'd marry him, I told him to get comfortable because the wait would be endless and he just laughed it off. Then another time, he did exactly the same over breakfast. Idiot. One would think that being 'dead' for over a decade would have put some sense into him."

"Yes, because wanting to marry the person you love, live with and… oh, that's right' have a grown child with is an obvious sign of madness," Sirius replied sarcastically.

Lulu gave him an annoyed look. "Go take a walk, Sirius," she suggested in an all-too-kind tone that clearly indicated a hidden threat in it.

He shrugged, not bothering to protest. "As you wish. But remember that sending me away won't change the fact that the two of you basically live like a married couple already."

That only annoyed her further. "Do I have to go fetch Muriel Prewett's cane or will you just go on your own?" she threatened.

Sirius rolled his eyes. "Sometimes I wonder why I even like you," he told her before reaching down to place a kiss on his wife's cheek. "I'll be inside, love."

"Behave," she replied with a smile.

"Me? Never. If the wedding cake explodes, it was me," he assured her, making Mia chuckle before he winked at her one last time while making his way back into the wedding marquee.

Left alone outside with her mother, Mia turned to her with an inquisitive look. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Come on, Lu," she said. "Why do you keep saying 'no' to Gabe?"

"I'm just not the marrying type, Mia," her mother pointed out. "I find living in sin satisfying enough. I don't have to be another boring old married person."

"Thanks," Mia replied dryly, taking the insult.

"Oh, you know I don't mean it like that," her mother said, nonchalant. "You and Sirius… it's like, married or not, you're always… courting each other. Flirting and… snogging against marquees. That sort of thing. Not all couples are so lucky to end up like that, frozen in that phase when one is always trying to get the other to fall deeper and deeper for the other. And I like the way things are between me and Gabe. We live together, we have fun, we're happy… we don't take each other for granted, which we probably will if we tie the knot. Why do things have to change?"

"Maybe they won't. And if they do, change isn't always bad…"

"Maybe not. But it's no coincidence they say that you don't change a winning team."

"I never thought you, of all people, would be afraid of change," Mia told her mother.

Lulu sighed. "Yeah, well, I never thought I, of all people, would spend like fifteen years pining for a bloke that was supposed to be dead only to end up getting him back. We've been through too much to risk screwing it all up by not living one day at a time."

Sighing, her daughter shook her head. Cautious Lulu… just when she thought she'd seen everything… "Well, it's your life, Lu. I'm not going to tell you how to live it. Just please don't hurt Gabe – he loves you. You've got to sit down and talk to him about all this because one can only take being turned down so many times," Mia told her mother. "And I'm not just saying this as some kid who wants to see her parents together. You know I'm long past that. I'm saying it because I care very much for both of you and I don't want to see you alone and miserable."

Lulu huffed stubbornly. "I hate it when you sound like the mother out of the two of us," she mumbled to Mia, who just smiled in return, knowing that, if Lulu had thought she was wrong, she'd have said it without a blink.

It wasn't more than five seconds later that Gabriel stepped out of the tent, holding a sleepy Mary in his arms and an also tired Alex by the hand. For a moment, Mia had to wonder if his timing meant he was aware of being the main theme in their discussion… "You ready to go, Luce?"

Lulu shook her head in return. "Give me a minute, I left my coat inside," she replied before quickly rushing back into the marquee, just as her grandson latched himself around one of Mia's legs, oddly silent.

"What's wrong, love?" Mia asked the little boy, reaching down to caress his soft black hair.

"He's a bit bushed over missing his nap," Gabe told his daughter. "Can't be a firecracker all day, I suppose."

Mia smiled and reached down to pick her son up to her arms. "Poor baby," she said, kissing the little boy's brow. Apparently, all that energy that had fuelled that morning's bath-time battle had ran out, leaving only an exhausted little boy behind… and no doubt the following morning he's be back to spitfire mood all over again. "You're tired, love?"

Alex shook his head stubbornly. "'m not, Mama." Yet, he didn't hesitate on resting his head against his mother's shoulder and relax tiredly in her hold.

"Of course you're not," she mock-agreed with the little boy, before approaching her father to check on Mary. That one wasn't even trying to fake awareness at this point, sleeping comfortably as she sucked on her thumb. "Well,I suppose at least this means you'll have a quiet night of babysitting duty. When these two are like this, they can usually sleep for hours."

Gabriel gave her a disbelieving look. "Quiet? It's never quiet when Luce is around," he pointed out, glancing into the marquee, trying to spot her.

"Well, you have a point there," Mia mumbled in agreement. "You do know she's the most pig-headed person you'll ever meet, right?"

"Of course," he replied, smiling.

"And when she sets her head into something, changing her mind is a nightmare."

He nodded again. "So, what's your take? Should I just give up or should I go on trying?"

Mia raised her eyebrows at him as she rocked Alex in her arms. Something told her that, somehow, they were both referring exactly to the same matter – the proposal. Later, she would wonder if that was because he knew Lulu so well or some sort of auror-exclusive perceptiveness. "Go on trying as long as you're up to it," she ended up saying. "Though you might want to emphasise that a ring on her finger won't make you take her for granted and vice-versa."

"I'll keep that in mind," he promised, seemingly catching the message.

"Count on her putting up a fight, though. She hates admitting defeat," she pointed out.

Gabriel chuckled. "Don't you think I know that? The first time she ever talked to me was to accuse my Quidditch team of cheating when we beat hers at a game. And she still insists that we did – last time that game came up, she refused to address me for two days. And it wasn't that long ago."

Mia huffed. That sounded just like Lulu. "I don't think I have to tell you that I'm very glad I took after you temper-wise."

He smiled at her. "That makes two of us. We can only handle one Lulu at a time, can't we?"

"That had better be because more than one of me would be far too much wonder for the world to tackle," Lulu said as she stepped out of the tent, overhearing the last part.

"Why else?" Mia asked, forcing a smile.

Her mother rolled her eyes. "Yeah right… Just pass that kid over already," she said, opening her arms so Mia could pass her snoozing grandson to her. She seemed to be about to say something else but, just as she received the little boy, Lulu's eyes appeared to focus on something… or rather someone else behind Mia's back. "Merlin, he's one or two inches away from becoming the perfect dancing partner for Flitwick," she mumbled.

"What?" Mia said, turning around in a flash as she recognized the discription. It was with much relief that she saw Harry approaching, perfectly disguised in his 'Barry Weasley' form, with Ginny by his side in a perfectly friendly fashion that would have fooled anyone who wasn't aware of his real identity. And, Merlin, he looked awfully short indeed.

"Well, we'll just get going now," Gabe said, shifting his granddaughter to his other arm.

Lulu nodded. "And try and have a bit of fun, Mia – this is a wedding, not a funeral."

Mia turned to them again and sighed. "Alright. And thanks for… you know," she said, nodding at the children.

"Like you ever needed to thank us for that," Lulu replied, rolling her eyes as she turned on her heel carrying a completely unaware Alex in her arms.

With Gabriel following her, the two were out of Mia's sight in a matter of seconds and, by the time she turned back to Harry, he and Ginny had already split ways. The redhead gave Mia a faint smile as she made her way back into the marquee while Harry remained behind. "Hey," he said, hands shoved into his pockets and a sheepish look on his unfamiliar face.

"Hi there. Spending a little time with Ginny?" Mia asked softly.

Harry nodded and sighed visibly. "Yeah…"

"Harry…"

"Does this ever pass?" he heard himself asking his godmother. "Knowing I'm leaving everyone behind… especially Ginny… It just sucks. I mean, I know I have to go, I know it's the right thing but…"

"The heart doesn't usually take logics under consideration," Mia provided.

He nodded sombrely. "I guess it doesn't. But does it ever go away? This feeling… You got through thirteen years away from Sirius. You never looked as happy as you look with him but… you got through it and you always had a smile to spare for me and Izzy."

Mia nodded softly. "I did," she replied. "Though I'll have to admit a large part of those came when I felt like anything but smiling." She sighed and took a step towards him, placing a hand on his shoulder. It felt so odd, having a heart-to-heart with that redheaded boy camouflaging Harry, and it would certainly seem odd for any onlooker, but she knew he needed to hear some encouraging words, even though giving him a pep talk concerning his adventure was anything but what she would've wanted. "Listen, Harry, I'd be lying if I said it would go away but it gets a little easier."

Harry took a breath. That simply didn't sound possible in his mind. "How?"

Mia shrugged. "Depends… To me, eventually, something come up to fill my mind and keep me from pondering over and over again about what I'd left behind," Mia explained. "It was still there but it wasn't in my mind every moment of every day, which is the worst part. To me, that thing was getting you and having Izzy. And to you… to you it will be the Horcrux hunt." She took a deep breath and then said what Harry most needed to hear. "As much as it pains me to admit it, _this _is something you need to do. You're not leaving all of us behind – you're going away to fight for us and we'll be here fighting for you too. As much as it still hurts to be away from the people you love, the reason why you're going makes all the difference."

Harry huffed. "That doesn't feel like much of a difference now."

"It will," Mia assured him. "And you won't be alone – I don't think you'll realize the importance of having your best friends there by your side until it's just the three of you. Being alone is the worst part."

"I thought you'd said pondering about what you'd left behind over and over again was the worst part."

"It is. But it gets even worse if you don't have anyone around to pull you back up from that dark place," his godmother told him. "And if you need any help, Harry…" she reached for his arm and lifted it in front of him so he could get a clear view of the watch she'd given him a few days before "… don't forget you have this. We're always here, Harry, for _anything_. So don't even hesitate in asking for help – there's no shame on it when one has a load to carry as heavy as yours."

Harry nodded silently. "I half-thought you were just going to say everything would be alright," he confessed.

"Would you've felt better if I had?"

He shook his head. It had surprised him how much he's preferred hearing his godmother's honest answer. "Nothing's that simple these days, is it?"

"No," she sadly agreed.

He nodded and thought of what to say next but nothing meaningful would really come. He supposed he'd have to leave goodbyes for after the reception, when he, Ron and Hermione left – his mind was far too exhausted from his… non-goodbye with Ginny a few minutes earlier. "I suppose I should go back inside. Before Ron and Hermione start wondering…"

She nodded. "Go along," Mia said, knowing she'd need a moment on her own. "I'll meet you there in a few minutes.

He nodded. "Thanks," he said right before starting to walk away. Before entering the tent, though, he paused. "I wish this thing could go both ways," he said, pointing at the watch. Unfortunately, while it allowed him to send signals to his family, it didn't allow them to send some back to him.

Mia shook her head. "Worry about yourself, Harry. We'll be fine," she said.

"I hope so. I'd rather not come back to a broken home," he replied before finally stepping out of his godmother's sight.

Finally alone, Mia closed her eyes and took a breath followed by another. Harry wasn't the only one fearing that war's consequences on their family. Just thought of it made her cringe. Odds weren't generous to them – they were Harry Potter's family. Although she'd never regret having him in her family, there was no denying that put a target in their heads, though it wasn't as large as the one on Harry's. Part of her couldn't believe she'd actually said all that. That she's actually… acknowledged how important her godson's insanely dangerous mission was for the world. Another, however, was proud she'd been able to tell Harry what he needed to hear even when it praised something she positively hated…

A double-edged sword, as always, she thought as she leaned back against the marquee's wall. These days nothing was simple, as Harry had said. Nothing was plain right or wrong. For now she could only hope she wouldn't later regret letting Harry go...

* * *

Leaving his wife outside to talk to her mother, Sirius made his way back to the large circular table that he'd been occupying earlier only to find a dark auburn-haired Tonks had also taken a seat there as she had what seemed to be a one-on-one with a massive slice of lemon pie resting on the plate opposite her.

"Mrs Lupin," he addressed her before occupying the chair on his cousin's right. "How are you doing this fine day?"

"Mr Black," she replied, matching his mock-formal tone as she took a bit of her pie. "Why do you sound like such an idiot this fine day?"

"Snippy, hum? Baby Lupin is already making its magic," Sirius commented with a chuckle, looking around before he said the last part to see if they were being overheard as Remus had told him that he and Tonks were trying to keep it quiet about the baby for now. So far, aside from Tonks's parents, only they and the Weasleys were aware of it. As no one seemed to be at earshot, he found it safe to mention it. "How's the little one doing, by the way?"

Tonks's face lit up at that. "He's doing just fine," she replied, unconsciously covering her middle with her free hand.

"He?"

"Or she, for all I know," she said, taking another bite of her pie. "I just seems weird to call the kid an 'it' all the time. Sounds a bit insulting because of… you know, Remus's condition. I suppose I'm sticking with 'he' until I know otherwise. But, in any case, it's probably a boy – only a specimen of the male sort could give a woman grief like this one gives me every morning."

Sirius narrowed his eyes at her. "I'll try and ignore that comment, for the sake of our friendship," he told her dryly. "Anyway, what were you doing here on your own? Why isn't your other half keeping you company?"

Tonks frowned. "What? Can't a person spend a few minutes on their own without being judged?"

"Sure they can. Unless they're at a wedding or any other sort of social gathering and are known sociable individuals such as yourself. Spill it, Nymphadora."

She looked awfully calm at being called by her first name and even took her time to eat another bit of pie. "Remember how I always get annoyed when someone calls me that name? Imagine that annoyance mixed with a little dose of pregnancy hormones," she said in a very calm tone.

Sirius gave her a defying look. "You don't scare me. I'm used to the wrath of pregnant women."

"Not to the wrath or pregnant women who are aurors and probably know how to get away with the perfect murder," she pointed out with a little sadistic smile on her face. "They won't find your corpse for centuries."

Well, that was just disturbing, Sirius thought. "Pregnancy makes you creepy," he told her.

"I know. Isn't it great?" she replied, her grin widening to form an overjoyed one. How amazing was it that threatening people with hormones made them like ten times more scared than normal threats? "More power for me."

"Good thing you and Moony are back in good terms, then, or else he'd be on the wrong end of that power trip of yours," Sirius commented.

"Oh, well, just give it a little time," she mumbled in annoyance, entertained with her pie.

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "For Merlin's sake, not again. What did he do now?"

She huffed. "Nothing particularly bad yet. He's all… overprotective. I mean, it's still in an acceptable level for now but I can just see it escalading awfully fast…" She suddenly paused and made a face. "Wait…why am I even telling you this? From what I've heard you were just as bad with Mia."

"Well, then you should be happy to hear I'm coaching your guy into not repeating my overprotectiveness-related mistakes," he informed his cousin.

She gave him a sceptical look. "Really?"

"Really," he assured her.

"Well, then warn him of this: if controlling everything I eat becomes a thing, it's going to get messy. I'll put up with the ridiculously healthy stuff he's been coking lately, which, I'll admit is sort of a sweet thing for him to do so far, but the baby and I need our daily dose of sugar… without being frowned at while we're consuming it."

"Ah! So that's why you're sneaking around with that pie," Sirius concluded. "What's that? The third slice? Fourth?"

"Just the second… and a half," she confessed. "And you know what the stupidest thing is? I don't even like lemon. I _hate_ it, in fact. In my book, it shouldn't even be called a fruit! Yet here I am, stuffing myself with it."

"If you think that's the oddest thing that will happen to you, I ought to tell you one thing or two about Mia's weird food mixes," Sirius pointed out. "Just thinking of it…" He made a face of disgust. "In any case, maybe I'll share that with Moony and point out that my kids came out fairly normal despite the shocking amount of tuna melt Mia consumed… and not always in a sandwich."

"Tuna melt?" Tonks asked, looking fairly intrigued for a moment before she cleared her throat. "Anyway, you go ahead and tell that to Remus."

"Of course. Anything for the mother of my future godchild," he replied.

She raised her eyebrows. "Your future what now?"

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "My future godchild – it's only fair I get one of those from Moony since I've already given him two and everything… And shall I remind you who punched him for you when he had that little bout of stupidity upon hearing of your condition?"

"You know, with you being his best friend and all, it's sort of your duty to punch some sense into him when he's acting stupid," she stated.

"_And _it also gives me automatic dibs on being godfather," he retorted.

"Says who?"

"Universal law."

Tonks rolled her eyes. "Universal law my arse," she mumbled, shaking her head. "_Fine_. You're at the top of the list – I'll give you that."

"Ah!" Sirius said, victorious.

"But you're not alone up there," she quickly added.

He gave her an appalled look. "What?"

"Look, just yesterday, Remus and I were talking about the godparent matter and, well, another candidate occurred to us."

"What? Who?" Sirius asked with highly exaggerated outrage.

Tonks sighed. "Harry," she said. "But before you say anything, hear me out," she quickly added. "You're one of the two best friends Remus has ever had, the other, from what I gathered, being James Potter, and, honestly, you're also pretty high up on my list of friends too. And that's why, when I came to you after my dear (occasionally idiotic) husband left, I fully expected you to go after him and bring his arse back to me on a platter. Don't think for a moment I'm not thankful for that. But Harry… he's part of the family too, yes, but who'd expect him, a kid who wasn't yet seventeen, to be the one to tell Remus what he needed to hear to make him realize what a complete _arse _he'd been when he'd left? I mean, Harry knew you were going to take care of it but still he didn't hesitate for a moment in defending this baby with that howler. He stood up for him or her the way any godfather should stood up for his godchild and that's bloody well impressive for a kid his age. Both of you would make great godfather, so… we thought we'd leave it for you two to discuss. Or maybe flip a coin over, if you'd rather leave it up to luck," she finally declared, nervously poking the pie with her fork. "Anyway, since I didn't get much morning sickness today, we figured the little one probably agreed with our choices. So, what do you say?"

Sirius took a pause to think of that and then sighed. "I say… I give the dibs up," he said.

Tonks raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"If it's between me and Harry, make Harry the godfather, not me," Sirius specified.

His cousin just looked at him blankly for a few seconds. "That's awfully selfless of you," she pointed out, thoroughly surprised.

"It's not selfless, it's right," he told her. "Harry's a good kid and, as you said, he'll make a bloody great godfather. Just forget the dilemma and let him have it. With this bloody war going on… his life's on the line."

"Maybe I should point out that so is yours," Tonks said. "And mine and Remus's and Mia's… everyone's lives are on the line. Especially when we're part of the Order."

"I don't think I need to tell you that his line is much thinner than ours, Tonks," Sirius mumbled, even though he hated to admit it.

Tonks pursed her lips together. She supposed her cousin was right about that… she'd gathered enough in the past year to understand that the Chosen One talk in the papers likely had its dose of truthfulness and that those extra defence lessons Remus had been giving Harry lately probably weren't meant to get him even further ahead of his classmates in the following year's DADA classes. She hadn't asked Remus about it and he hadn't told her much either but she knew her husband well enough to be almost sure that he was aware of the signs too but not of the actual plan. Whatever Harry was up to, it was dangerous enough for him and his godparents to try and keep the details hidden from their closest friends, either it was for Harry's or their own protection.

"Anyway," Sirius continued, oblivious to her thoughts. "My point is that I have lived: I had the greatest friends in the world; I stood up to my crappy family and gave them the most grief I could possibly give; I fell for one of the greatest girls I've ever met, married her, and had the greatest kids with her; I mocked, pranked and hexed at least half the people whose guts I hate and plan to get to the other half just as soon as I can. But Harry… his life has just started. I mean, he's been of age for _a day_ – he still has plenty… and I mean _plenty _to scratch of his bucket list."

"And becoming a godfather is one of those things?" Tonks asked.

"It's probably the farthest thing from his mind right now but, yeah, I think it is. Merlin, it sucks to even think this, but this may be the only chance he gets, so, between me and him, pick him," he told her.

His cousin just observed him for a few moments. "I knew there was some reason why I liked you," she finally said. "I'll talk to Remus."

Satisfied, Sirius grinned. "Thanks."

"You know, if you didn't have such a great point and I wasn't so thankful at Harry for that blessed howler of his, that speech alone would have made me pick you. It sort of shows what a great godfather you'd make."

"What a great godfather_ I'll_ make," he corrected her. "I'm not sure if you've realized that yet but me giving that kid up for Harry doesn't mean I'm giving up my entitlement to a godchild fathered by Moony. As I've already pointed out, I did give him two of them…"

Tonks raised her eyebrows. "So, let me get this straight – you think that by letting Harry be this baby's godfather, we're technically obligated to have another kid after this one?"

"Yep," he confirmed.

"And you really think Remus will be up to it?"

"Maybe. I fully trust you to seduce him into it," Sirius stated with a grin. After all, if the woman had gotten good old 'I'll never allow myself to share the burden of my life with anyone else' Moony to marry her, she could do pretty much anything. "Come on, you don't want the little one to be an only child like you were, do you? Bet you really missed a little brother or sister to boss around when you were little."

Tonks seemed thoughtful for a moment. She supposed a couple of kids wouldn't be so hard to handle… if they took after their father in mostly good behaviour. If they took after her, however… "You know what? How about I have this one first and then get back to you about that later? At this point, my head can only process the thought of one little Lupin at a time."

"Ah, you know what would be even better? If you had twins," Sirius pointed out with a grin. "Just imagine two little Lupins crying in harmony… that's the dream."

"I'm not having twins," she said, her eyes narrowed.

"Come on. That probably wouldn't be so bad – it would be like ripping a plaster all at once. Or couple of them. Two loud squirming ones that wouldn't give you a rest for the next seventeen years…"

"I'm _not _having twins," she insisted. "Elizabeth checked. Now quit it."

"Alright, alright… just saying," he mumbled, biting his lower lip, trying to keep himself from cracking the last joke. Unsuccessfully. "Alright, I just have to say this last one: if you were having twin boys, you could call them Romulus and Rem… Stop pointing your wand at me!" he yelled when he saw her aiming at him.

"When I say 'quit it' these days, you'd better actually _quit it_," she stated, giving her wand a little twirl that had Sirius flinching visibly. Nothing happened, though, as it was just a warning. "Charlie's going to be the living example of that," she told him, putting her wand back down.

"What Charlie?"

"Charlie Weasley, who else?"

Sirius looked around the marquee and saw the guy in question sitting by his newly married brother's side, looking completely fine. For some reason, that only scared him more. "What did you do to him?"

"Why would I tell you that? At this point, not even he knows," she cryptically replied. "He had it coming for that big mouth of his, though."

Sirius swallowed hard at that. "You know what? I think I'm just going to have that talk about food limitations with Moony right now," he said, quickly getting up.

"That's right, Sirius. Run!" she said, chuckling under her breath as he quickly made his way across the room. Merlin, she just loved seeing how they cringed at her threats these days. "Start learning, little one," she mumbled to the baby, patting her flat stomach. "This is how Mummy gets all the power."

* * *

Bridesmaid duty hadn't been as bad as Izzy had expected.

Aside from a couple of minor hyperventilation episodes, everything had been very low-profile. Fleur had, in fact, not acted at all like that picture of a monster-bride the twins and Ginny had painted in her mind – she'd more like a deliriously happy (to the point of tears in one occasion) bride. True, thought, Izzy had to admit heard whispers that Madame Delacour might have slipped a calming potion into her daughter's herbal tea but that might just be bridesmaid gossip.

And, afterwards, marching down the aisle with the other bridesmaids for the binding ceremony also hadn't been _that _bad since, after all, all eyes had been on the bride, not her.

But not everything could go too well, could it? It almost had, she had to admit… until the reception had come and Muriel Prewett had sat by her side, of all places on that comically large table saved for the bride and the groom's wedding party and their families.

Never before had she thought she could find an elderly person that unpleasant. And saying that was an understatement. Truth was, at some point she'd been so insanely sick of listening to the woman's prejudiced comments and criticisms that she'd wished, for a short moment of insanity, that old age would do its trick and move Muriel to another completely different stage of existence…

Her brain tried desperately, urgently to find an excuse to leave but nothing would come. Something in that woman's aura was sucking her ability to think like a Dementor sucked a person's soul. Through that long hour that had actually felt like a week, she's shot looks of despair to her friends several times so they'd come and rescue her but they'd either not see her at all or pretend they weren't getting it, like had been Ron's case. Bastard.

"… Molly just had to marry herself into this… _family_, if that word even applies," Muriel was saying, shaking her head in disapproval. "She could have had so much better… a good marriage into a wealthy family. Like Susan did – my brother's daughter, Molly's aunt, that is. Phillip Davis gave her a good life."

Izzy, who'd been sipping on her pumpkin juice, nearly choked at that. "Davis?" she asked, recognizing it as her mother's maiden one.

"Why, yes. The Davises from Anglesey. They're all dead, now, though," the one said, her sigh being her only indication of grief. "All dead except from Susan's daughter, I think… saw the girl twice in her life at most. No idea what's of her these days. I think her name was Alicia… or maybe Amanda…"

"Amelia," Izzy instinctively said through her teeth as her brain put the pieces together.

The elderly woman shot her a sharp look. "That's right. How did you know that, young lady?"

She gulped, already regretting saying anything. For a moment, she allowed herself to picture her mother on her end of that hellish conversation. She wouldn't wish it on her worse enemy, let alone _her own mother_. So, faced with that, Izzy did the obvious thing: she lied. Or omitted, at least. "She's my teacher at Hogwarts. Er… the name rang a bell."

Muriel scrunched her nose. "A teacher," she repeated disapprovingly, shaking her head. "Dull profession. Then again, Amelia was an awfully dull child, if I remember well. Lacked strong blood, I imagine. She was adopted, you know? Not many people know that. Susan and Phillip were far from interested on having children – had important jobs in the ministry… foreign affairs, I think. Took most of their time. But then that Margaret Davis, her mother-in-law started hounding for a grandchild… I'm told she even told them she'd leave all her estate to some charity thing if they didn't give her one. Raving mad, that woman was,"

Silent, Izzy had to make a lot of effort not to frown at that – of all the characters on that odd story that was her mother's upbringing, Margaret Davis was the only one aside from Lulu who was fondly remembered. Certainly a person Lulu and her mother had liked so much wouldn't have pulled such a low blow… But then again, from what the Weasleys had told her of Muriel Prewett, the woman telling her own version of the story and kicking the nastiness up a notch shouldn't have surprised Izzy at all.

Oblivious to Izzy's thoughts, though, Muriel kept speaking. "Susan and Phillip didn't care much for the inheritance, of course," she said, placing them on the highest pedestal she could ever find in her own head. "Still, they adopted the girl to fulfil that madwoman's wish… Susan was too kind – if it were me, I'd just have committed her. Some lose it in their old age. Go nutters and all – not me, of course…"

Sitting silently on her chair, secretly hoping Muriel would find her as dull as she's found her mother and go away, Izzy begged to differ, disgusted at the woman's words. Hateful, _hateful_ woman.

"Auntie Muriel," a familiar, much more pleasant voice, said behind them.

Utterly relieved, Izzy turned around immediately at seeing George standing there behind her chair. She didn't wait a second before using her face to beg him for help. '_Get me out of here_', she thought as loud as she could, hoping that, by some miracle, she'd suddenly develop telepathic powers that would allow George to hear her.

He seemed to get the message well enough and didn't disappoint her. "I'm afraid your conversation buddy is needed somewhere else," he said in an all-too-sweet tone.

Muriel frowned. "What for?"

There was a pause during which George seemed to be thinking of what to say, torn between using an actual excuse or some odd retort, which he knew would insult Muriel's sanity beyond reason… and, Merlin, did that annoy her. In the end, it wasn't so hard to choose. "An emergency. Her cat's just burst into flames," he said.

On her seat, Izzy gave him an 'are you serious?' sort of look, to which he responded with a careless shrug.

Muriel seemed to catch it too and her already shrivelled face seemed to get even more wrinkles. "What do you think I am? Some senile old woman? You think you're very funny! You and that… that brother of yours. The one who looks just like you," she said.

"The word you're looking for would be 'twin'," he helpfully provided. "Come along, Isabelle."

Unwilling to give up that opportunity, Izzy stood up and moved to his side without hesitation.

"As if it wasn't bad enough you were some disrespectful clown… in my time it was disrespectful for a gentleman to call a lady by her given name," the older woman scolded. "It was Miss this, Mrs. that…"

George shrugged. "I guess it's a good thing that neither am I a gentleman, not is this the sixteenth century anymore." With that, he turned to Izzy and nodded in the opposite direction. "Come on."

She didn't even try to say anything against that, juts following him instead. Words couldn't say how grateful she was to him at the moment, despite the very lame, completely transparent excuse he'd used to get her away from Muriel. Still, she couldn't help poking fun at him a little, especially after he's been such an idiot that morning. "Shouldn't we at least pretend I have a cat that has actually just spontaneously combusted?" she asked when they were far away from Muriel's earshot.

"Pretending would only make the old bat think we care enough to fool her convincingly," he replied. "Which at least _I _don't."

"I could tell – that was awfully rude, you know?"

"Damn," he mumbled. "I was aiming for 'horrifyingly rude'. But I suppose I can blame this one on Fred ditching me to go snog Angie in the nearest broom cupboard. That degree of rudeness can only be achieved by the pair of us working together…"

"I take it you _really_ don't like your great-aunt… or great-great-aunt, whatever she is," she concluded.

"You think?" he asked sarcastically as he walked her closer to one of the buffet tables. "On a scale of nine to ten, how unpleasant was she?"

Izzy took a moment to think. "Would you think I was exaggerating if I said there wasn't a scale that could accurately measure how insufferable that woman is?"

George snorted. "No one who's spent more than five minutes with her would think that," he assured her. "And, trust me, I was unfortunate enough to have spent a whole lot more time with her than that… Old bat always spent Christmas around here, you know? It was a nightmare… a nightmare Fred and I ended in our first year by putting a dungbomb under her chair. Best thing we ever did, even though that led her to write us out of her will… Worth it – by the time she eats it, we'll probably own more than she ever did all through her life."

She didn't doubt it, the way their shop was profiting these days even with a war looming over… "I guess I should be thankful she and my mum don't get along," she mumbled.

George frowned. "Your mum knows her?"

"Technically, she'd be her great-aunt too, from what I gathered. I don't think I've ever been this glad that my mum was adopted," she stated.

"Me too," George mumbled by her side, casually passing her a glass of butterbeer.

"Hum?" she asked, not quite catching what he'd said.

"Hum?" he replied in the same fashion, trying to look clueless. "Anyway, I'm supposed to pass on our most sincere apologies over you ending up seated by Muriel's side. When I spotted you, you looked like you wanted to throw yourself under the Hogwarts Express."

"That thought may have crossed my mind, among some others of a more murderous nature," she replied dryly. "In any case, why on Earth did you seat her at the main table if no one there seems to like her?"

"We didn't," George replied. "She was supposed to have been sitting over there," he said, pointing at a table by the tent's main entrance, as far away from the main table as it was possible. "But Mum insisted we placed seats at the main table for everyone from our… immediate family, which apparently includes certain members we haven't spoken to in more than a year because they're conceited bastards who only care about looking good at the ministry."

Izzy nodded. _Percy, then,_ she thought.

"Obviously," George continued, "the seat ended up vacant and, also obviously, Muriel insisted on taking it and Mum ended up giving in – I think she's sort of afraid of her, to be honest. Anyway, none of us realized you'd actually end up by her side until it was too late – if we did, we'd have picked out two of Fleur's cousins who don't speak a word of English to flank her instead. That way, no one would have given a crap about what she was saying."

"Merlin, she'd _hate _that," Izzy said.

"I know – such a missed opportunity…" he agreed. "I guess we'll have to leave it for the next wedding if, Merlin help us, she lasts that long. Dad says it's the nastiness that keeps her going. _Dad_, the nicest person you'll ever meet. It just shows what a pain Muriel is."

"Nasty people can bring out the worst in good people," she agreed, taking a sip of her butterbeer.

"Yes they can. Now, completely changing the subject to one that suits me better, where's that dance you promised me?" he asked.

"I don't recall ever using the word 'promise' concerning that matter," she pointed out. "What do I have to do for you to let me off the hook?"

He thought of giving her the straight answer by assuring her there was no way out of that but decided to be a bit daring instead. "If you handed me, say, a thousand galleons, I might consider it…"

Izzy smiled. "Give me a moment to go borrow them from my dad," she replied, motioning to walk away before she felt him grabbing her arm before she could take a single step. The feeling itself gave her the sensation of butterflies in her stomach, she noted in embarrassment. "Hey," she faintly complained.

"Come on, the thought of dancing with me can't actually revolt you that much that you'd hand me a thousand galleons to get out of doing it. Without a word of protest, let me add. Who are you and what have you done to Isabelle Black, the girl who relieved me of a small fortune to mind the shop's cash register for like an hour?" he asked in disbelief.

She gulped. It wasn't that she hated the idea of dancing with him. Deep down, she was actually eager for it… except, it also scared her thoughtless. What if she unconsciously did or said something that would reveal her… issue? The one involving that stupid crush on him, that was. She'd just managed to act normal around him, for Merlin's sake. "I don't dance – it's embarrassing," she told him.

George raised an eyebrow and pointed at the clear space in the centre of the marquee that served as the dance floor, where Luna Lovegood and her father seemed to be performing some sort of tribal dance… "Any sort of embarrassing dance moves would pale in comparison to _that_."

Well, he did have a point there, she had to admit. It almost made her feel bad, just standing there and doing nothing while Luna and her father made such a spectacle out of themselves on the dance floor.

"Come on, Isabelle. You owe me – I've just saved you from Muriel's clutches," he told her.

"I owe _you?_ Do I need to remind you of the ten years you took of my life expectancy this morning with that unbreakable oath stunt of yours? If anything, we're even," she said in outrage.

"It's not my fault you can be so gullible," he replied.

"I'm not…!"

"Oi, George," someone suddenly called, making them both turn to the source of the voice just to see Charlie approaching them, "… or Fred, whichever you are. I need a favour."

George gave him an irritated look. "Name it, brother. I swear I will do anything on my power to make it happen, or my name isn't 'whichever you are'," he said sarcastically.

Her own annoyance forgotten, Izzy bit her lip, trying not to laugh as Charlie carelessly shrugged. "Blame me, will you? You two should wear name tags all the time… although you'd probably switch them around just for kicks… Anyway, as for that favour – I need you to keep an eye on Mum while I…" he cleared his throat and glanced at a group of Fleur's part-Veela female relatives, who were standing by a table, giggling over something.

"…put the moves on our lovely new Veela cousins?" George finished for him. "You know, with all the champagne they've been downing, they're probably pretty tipsy by now. Mum would frown upon you taking advantage of tipsy girls."

"I know – why do you think I'm asking you to keep an eye on her?"

"Their English is pretty limited too. Not sure how you'll… what's the expression? Ah! Charm them," he said, making quotation marks with his hands.

"Oh, I've got that covered," he said, reaching for his pocket and removing what appeared to be a paper napkin with stuff written all over it. "I asked Tonks for help with the basic lines."

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "Tonks knows French?" she asked sceptically.

Charlie snorted. "Please… The Latin from some spells would make her cough up as it was when we went to Hogwarts. The only French she knows will be the curses she'll throw at Lupin in the delivery room." He snorted at that. "But, anyway, I asked her to use that translating charm aurors use on foreign documents. Pays up to have an old school pal in the force."

"Yeah, that must be a blast. Tell me, did you ask her that before or after we ran into her yesterday at the Leaky?"

"I asked _when_ I ran into her," he replied. "She did it on the spot."

"Ah. Give me that," George asked, snatching the napkin from his brother's hand. When he looked at it, he frowned – that thing might as well have been written in ancient Greek because he'd have understood just the same. Clueless, he just passed it to Izzy, having heard from Ginny she was more enlightened in the language then he was.

"Well?" Charlie asked.

Izzy forced herself to keep a straight face while reading. "It… it will certainly catch their attention," she said, giving the napkin back.

"Great," the older redhead replied, walking away towards his targets with a huge grin. "Wish me luck."

You'll need it," she mumbled under her breath.

"So," George said when he was sure his brother was completely out of earshot, "what did that really say?"

Izzy gulped. "I'm not comfortable with repeating half of that out loud."

"That bad?"

"Well… the mildest part involved him comparing someone's face to a hog, so take your own conclusions," she pointed out. "At the very best, he'll get away after some slapping… Tonks must have some old grudge against him…"

"No, it's actually a pretty new one," George informed her. "Charlie, Fred and I ran into her last night at the Leaky Cauldron when she came over to order dinner or something. Let's just say Mr Dragon Brains over there made this lovely comment about the effect of pregnancy on… er, natural cup sizes, if you know what I mean. And, trust me, whatever you're imagining, it was at least ten times worse – worst joke I ever heard and I've heard a lot of them. For a moment, I thought she'd hex him where he stood but she just got this really shifty look in her eyes like she was thinking 'I'm gonna get you for this when you least expect it'. He's awfully oblivious, as you've probably noticed too."

"And, apparently, he fell straight into the grave she dug up for him," Izzy replied just as they spotted Charlie being slapped across the face by one of Fleur's horrified cousins, who also called him a very unrepeatable name in French. As the group of girls got away from him, one stepped very hard on his foot, clearly on purpose. "That's got to hurt his ego more than it hurt his foot."

"You've got that one right," George agreed, raising his glass of butterbeer to Charlie in a mock-toasting fashion. "You know, Charlie likes to believe he's a funny bloke but he seems to suffer from this affliction called 'foot in mouth disease'. If you asked me, I'd say it was from spending too much time with dragons. I mean, what's even the point of mocking any of Tonks's physical attributes when she's a _metamorphagus_ and can change them at will?"

"You've got a point there," Izzy had to agree. "He's lucky all he got was being slapped and having his foot stepped on."

"Oh, but it isn't all. Here comes Mum," the redhead said, chuckling as his mother approached her second son and grabbed him by the ear, dragging him behind her to the exit of the tent, no doubt for a good scolding. Tonks, who now stood with Remus by one of the tables, observed the scene with a huge grin on her face as her husband eyes her with suspicion. "Well, I think it's best that we get to the dance floor before Charlie points the finger at me. Mum would never dare dragging me out too if you were around to be part of the scene it would make…"

"George…"

"Come on. It's just a dance, Isabelle," he told her. "Do it for the sake of my hide."

She was set on protesting again but when his eyes fell right on hers, the butterflies were back and she just couldn't refuse. It was happening again, she thought. For the second time in less than a week, she was about to give into something she'd been all set in not doing because of George. Damn him, she thought in annoyance. "Fine," she heard herself saying. "But just as long as Luna and her dad are around to make us look good in comparison."

He grinned. "Well, come along, then," George said, taking her hand and walking her towards the dance floor.

Behind him, Izzy gulped loudly and felt the butterflies batting their wings furiously in her stomach. _It's just a dance_, she told herself. _Get over it already. _But, of course, her body wouldn't listen. It made her feel ridiculous. Like one of those stupid giggly girls who hang out with Romilda Vane, fantasising about their future romances with famous people, ranging from Harry to the Weird Sister's base player. _Ridiculous_, she thought again. _You're better than_ that.

But, suddenly, something else caught her attention. A flash of silver in the corner of her eyes. A lynx-shaped patronus, she noted when her eyes focused on it.

Everyone in the room seemed to freeze, including herself and George, who appeared to grasp her hand harder and take a step so he was partially standing between her and the lynx in a protective fashion. The feeling that something was very wrong took them all over and the seconds that passed before the massage came felt endless. And when it did, it hit them all like a train.

"The Ministry has fallen. Mad-Eye is dead. They're coming for you."

**A/N: Well, not much to say... Voldemort does have the worst timing ever. I hope you liked the chapter - it was quite the ride to write and edit. Feedback is welcome, as always! Review!**


	47. Captured

**A/N: Word of advice: if your father decides to go frugal and convinces himself he can paint a six-bedroom-house with his kids in a week, tell him to go get his head checked... I apologize for the delay but between exams (I'm one exam away from graduating!), a week-long vacation and painting duty (as well as cleaning duty) my time to write was pretty limited. The chapter didn't quite turn the way I'd planned but, well, if I kept scapping stuff, it wouldn't be up for another month...**

**That said, go ahead and read :D Oh, and, by the way, can't forget to wish Harry Potter a happy birthday since it's 31 July!**

Everything happened very fast, yet incredibly slow after the lynx-shaped patronus entered the room and shouted out the dreaded message in Kingsley Shacklebolt's voice.

Later, Izzy would remember it all but, at the moment, the whole scene was hard to register: the sounds of glass breaking mixed with people running and shouting at each other as furniture was moved and knocked over everywhere by everyone's movements towards the exits. It was all a big blur for her at first – all she could register was her heart beating louder and faster than she thought it ever could and George's hand grasping hers incredibly hard as they ran, like he feared he'd end up losing her in the crowd of hysterical guests that kept bumping into them from all directions. Everything seemed to move in a slow motion around her, almost like it wasn't real.

At some point during her running, her eyes landed on Harry, who appeared to be standing near Muriel's table flanked by Hermione. He looked just as stunned everyone else, yet, at the same time, ready for combat as he held his wand in his hand. His eyes scanned around the crowd of sprinting guest for something or someone too – Ron, Ginny, his family, maybe? – and met hers for just a second, right at the same time Ron appeared by their side and Hermione grabbed both of their arms – it only took one blink from Izzy's eyes for all three to be gone from her sight. Just gone. Later it would occur to her that might have been the last time she's see her brother for a very long time.

But suddenly, as some guest bumped into her really hard from the side, nearly knocking her over if it wasn't for George catching her, everything became much clearer. The blur and the slow motion started to fade and she could actually think again. It only took her mind a moment to register what Hermione's ability to apparate with the boys meant. "The wards are broken," she mumbled.

Ahead of her, George, who'd already resumed running and pulling her behind him, turned to her with an inquisitive look in his eyes. "What?" he asked, clearly not having heard what she'd said over all the noise.

"The wards are broken," she said in a louder fashion. "I saw… people are apparating now." And if people could get out, they could so much more easily get in too…

He cursed under his breath and paused for just a moment, considering if he should do the same – apparate away. Not for himself, of course – the day when George Weasley turned his back to a fight to save his own arse was still miles away from being witnessed. But Isabelle Black was a completely different matter – he simply couldn't brush off that incredibly powerful feeling that he needed to get her out of that place as soon as possible. To get her home where she'd be safe. It felt vital and, for some reason, he couldn't seem to come up with any strategy related to the fight that was about to come other than how to get her out of there. And why? one might ask… He knew why – as much as he really didn't want to acknowledge it, he knew exactly why, of all people in that bloody wedding, his family included, Isabelle Black was the one he was so badly dragging away from harm.

"Let's just go," he ended up telling her, concluding that apparating from somewhere where people bumped into them every five seconds wouldn't be the best of ideas unless they wanted to drag someone with them or end up splinched.

"Go where?" she yelled back, finally completely aware of the chaos that was her surroundings. "George?"

He didn't respond, just dragging her once more behind him to the nearest exit from the marquee, and she didn't ask again as her attention was suddenly cast on trying to spot her parents in the crowd. She couldn't find them anywhere in the middle of that mess and imagined the situation would be the same for them. If only she'd brought with her the two-way mirror Harry had left her…

She was able to spot a few familiar features in that mess of people, though: a flash of blonde hair somewhere that she could just tell belonged to Luna, someone in white wedding robes that was no doubt Fleur and several girls wearing dresses just like hers who would be her fellow bridesmaids…

And minister was still there too, she noted. While Bones seemed to be more than willing to fight whatever attack was coming their way, yielding her wand right out of her robes, a couple of Order members whose names Izzy couldn't recall seemed to be trying to convince her she needed to leave and save herself.

"… _as long as you're alive and out of their reach, people will never accept Voldemort's crew as their rulers, Minister. You need to go!_" one of the order members, the female one, was telling the woman.

She wasn't able to see the woman's reaction to that as, right at that moment, George pulled her out of the tent, passing right by Tonks, who seemed to be trying to make some crowd control, on their way out. A wave of cold air nearly froze both of them just as they stepped outside which, along with the fog that was forming, announced the Dementor's arrival.

"Crap," George cursed. "We've got to go now."

Her eyes widened and she looked at him in alarm. "What? Go where?"

He pulled her aside from the tent's exit so no one would bump into them. "Brace yourself."

And the last thing Izzy could see before he apparated them away from the Burrow was a blurry image of several black-clad individuals apparating nearby. The next thing she knew, she was going through the always unpleasant feeling of apparition and then she and George were standing alone in some alley, away from the noise that had filled the air at the Burrow.

"W… what…?" she mumbled, just gathering her new surroundings before turning to George with wide eyes. "What the hell did you do? Where are we? Take me back! There were Death Eaters there!"

"Sorry to point out the obvious but I got you out of there _because_ of the Death Eaters," George replied, his tone far from its usual joking and relaxed tone. "You need to go home."

Home? It was only when he said that that she realized the alley they were in was just a couple of buildings away from 12 Grimmauld Place. He'd brought her home, she thought, torn between relief and fury, the latter quickly overpowering her feelings. "_No_, I need to go _back_. My parents are in there at the Burrow!"

"So are mine – my whole family, as a matter of fact – and that's why I'm going back there just as soon as I make sure you're at home for your own bloody safety," he replied.

She gave him an appalled look. "Oh, that's great! How chivalrous of you. You get me out of the Burrow and want to make me stay home 'for my own safety' yet you want to turn around and march right back there. I'd completely forgotten you were the one out of us two who's _invulnerable to injury_!" she yelled sarcastically. "If you get to go back, so should I! I learned more about dueling in the year _both_ of us were in the DA than most people do their whole lives!"

"I know but it doesn't _work_ that way, Isabelle. Merlin…" he said, his voice filled with exasperation before he tried and changed his tone. "Look, _I_'m not the one out of the two of us who's still underage. You've got no place being in the middle of that mess. The Burrow is minutes away from becoming a battlefield!" And Merlin, he thought, did saying that just make him sound like his mother?

Hearing that only served to make Izzy angrier. Her eyes practically blazed. "That's awfully hypocrital of you, George! You never gave a crap of whether you were underage or not, much less where you had place being! What makes my case so different? Me being a girl?"

He rolled his eyes at how absurd that was. "This has _nothing_ to do with you being a girl and you know it," he replied. Normal people said 'thank you', not 'take me back and let me blow myself up' when someone took them out of a bloody battlefield. Why couldn't she be one of those people for just a day? "You… Isabelle, this is about as clear as I'm willing to make myself be right now, so do me and yourself a favour by listening: you're my friend and you were with me when those Death eaters came, therefore it's up to me to keep you safe because, while you're a fifteen-year old schoolgirl, I'm a member of the bloody Order of the Phoenix. _Here_ is where you're the safest, so just go home, tell your house-elf to close the floo connection just in case and stay there until your parents come back. I'm _not_ taking you back, Isabelle."

Frustrated, she pursed her lips and looked at him. He looked more serious than she'd ever seen him or even thought a Weasley twin being capable of being. Still, that didn't change the fact that she was pissed off. "Damn you, George," she hissed. "You are such an idiot!"

"I may be an idiot but you're going home, Isabelle," he carelessly replied, circling her with one arm and tugging her towards the alley's exit. "I've got somewhere else to be."

She huffed. "I can't believe you're going back. That just makes you an even bigger idiot."

"Says the girl who's been yelling at me to take her along," he cheekily replied.

She let out a sound of frustration and just looked away from him. Merlin helped her if that guy couldn't annoy her more than anyone else she knew. Big idiot… And why her, anyway? Why had he dragged her out of the Burrow and not someone else such as any of the dozens of family members he'd had running all over the place too? While at the moment the fact that he's picked her, of all people, to save just annoyed her, for a little moment she almost let herself fall into the delusions of some infatuated girl – which she refused to believe she was – and saw that as a sign George might… just might return her… odd feelings towards him.

Still, it didn't make her any less furious that he was making her stay home like some defenceless child… which she wasn't. Defenceless _or _a child. She'd been right in the middle of the Battle at the Department of Mysteries in the previous year and made it out practically unscathed… That sort of gave her more battle experience than George and yet the hypocrital jerk was determined to be the one to go back. Just thinking of it made her even more frustrated for the most varied reasons. "If you get hurt or killed over there, George," she couldn't help threatening, "I swear to Merlin I'll find a way to bring you back just to kill you all over again."

George rolled his eyes. "A concerned death threat… every bloke's dream," he replied dryly. "Just go home, Isabelle. I'll be fine and, before know it, your parents will be home."

"You can't really promise that, can you?" she replied.

"No. But your parents always made it back. All you have to do is trust them to do it again and you won't drive yourself mental," he informed her.

"Easier said than done," she told him faintly.

And something in the way she said it or maybe in he way she looked him in the eyes made him see it: she was scared. Beneath that whole I-might-just-punch-you front she was putting up for him ever since he's gotten her out of the Burrow, she was actually terrified. And why wouldn't she be? Her parents were somewhere riddled with Death Eaters and Dementors, her brother had vanished to Merlin-knew-where… their lives had pretty much changed from that day on. He couldn't honestly say she was the only one shaking inside about that…

On her spot, Izzy also seemed to be observing him closely and proceeded to look away from him when she caught his eyes meeting hers. "I'm fine," she said like she could read his thoughts and thought being scared made her weak…

He rolled his eyes. "Come here," he told her.

"What for?"

"Just do what you're told for once, Isabelle," he told her. "I'm sort of in a hurry here."

Nervous, she bit her lip and looked back at him a bit sceptically before taking that little step further and unknowingly allowing him to wrap his arms around her in a comforting hug that caught her, and even him, by surprise.

As embarrassed as she might feel for the first few seconds, that closeness just felt so incredibly soothing that she couldn't help relaxing… soothing and more right than she'd have ever expected or would like to admit. For a moment, she could actually let herself forget what was taking place miles and miles away at the Burrow. She was having her moment.

"It's gonna be fine," he told her. "One way or another, it will… or else Fred and I will probably be out of business pretty fast."

She had to chuckle at that comment and took a step back. "You're still an idiot," she informed him.

"And you're still going home," he replied.

She let a little frustrated breath but, before she could stop herself, she found herself leaning forward and placing a quick kiss on his cheek. "For luck… so you don't blow yourself up or anything," she lamely told him before turning on her heel and making her way along the street leading to her house.

George just stood there, immobile and watching her with wide eyes. Well, she'd gone and done it… That was so not the time… or the place… or the _age…_ He was doomed in so many different ways he couldn't even begin to name them all – the battle ahead of him kind of started looking tame as opposed to only a handful of those. Fred would never let him hear the end of it because he _always knew _when something was going on with him…

At a distance, Izzy looked over her shoulder to see if he was still there and, when she spotted him, she appeared to give him some sort of annoyed look. Back to being pissed off, he guessed. Maybe she was right and he should have allowed her to fight – he couldn't deny that, were their roles reversed, he's have been equally furious. But he still didn't regret taking her away, even if it was for purely selfish reasons.

When, a few seconds later, he finally saw Grimmauld Place's door opening and Gabriel McKinnon letting his granddaughter into the house, he became even surer he'd done the right thing. She was home and she was safe. That was what mattered.

He'd rather be the idiot who'd pulled her away from danger than the one who'd let her get hurt. And, Merlin, didn't the reason behind that just annoy him…

Maybe he might have found it amusing if he was aware he wasn't the only one feeling that.

* * *

They'd never really stood a chance, Sirius thought angrily as he stood by Mia's side while the Death Eaters rounded up the rest of the people that hadn't managed to escape the Burrow around them. Not against that bloody army Voldemort had sent over, outnumbering them by more than three to one after most people had managed to escape.

True, he and the rest of the Order had tried to put up a fight against the invaders but, little more than five minutes into what could scarcely be called a battle, when a third of them had already been disarmed and another third was lying either stunned or injured on the floor, they'd realized that standing down would be their only chance of escaping with their lives. As brave as they might want to believe they were, all of them knew that they were no use to their side if they were dead and, that time, Voldemort had no doubt had the upper hand over them.

"Do you think they're okay?" Mia anxiously said by his side in a barely noticeable whisper. "Izzy and… Harry."

Sirius sighed. At least, he thought, the kids had apparently escaped. While Harry had simply vanished into thin air along with Ron and Hermione, indicating he'd likely anticipated his departure to the Horcrux hunt by a few hours, his daughter had last been spotted by Tonks escaping the marquee along with George Weasley only to not be seen again after that. He could only hope she'd been taken somewhere safe. "Wherever they are, they have to be better off there than they'd be in here in here, love," he reassured his wife.

She sighed and nodded, looking aimlessly around the group of guests, order members and Weasleys the Death Eaters had gathered in front of the Burrow while they searched the house. Everyone seemed to be trying to hide their terror, some more successfully than others.

At a distance, Remus stood at one of the group's edges with Tonks, his arms firmly wrapped around his wife's waist like he was trying to protect her and their unborn child – and, for once, the metamorphagus didn't seem to be fighting back any of her husband's protectiveness at all, just resting her head on his shoulder with a sort of lost expression on her face. It didn't take Mia much thinking for her to conclude her husband's cousin must be shaken up the news of her fallen mentor, Mad-Eye. The man had always had a soft spot for the clumsy auror he and Kingsley Shacklebolt had under their wings.

It was hard to believe Alastor Moody was dead. How or by whose hand he'd lost his life, though, was still a mystery – somehow that made the whole thing feel worse, not knowing how he'd died of if he'd suffered. It was unbelievable. The guy had lived through more near-death experiences than likely all of them together… in a way, everyone had always expected him to be the one outliving them all just to have a laugh about how his constant vigilance had paid off in the end. But it only took once for it to be all over, she thought – that just showed how fragile human life was, no matter how strong or special they grew to believe they were.

Truth was none of them really had any idea of what was going to happen, when or if they'd be able to go back home to their families and make that whole thing nothing more than a bad memory.

"What do you think they are going to do to us?" Mia heard herself asking Sirius.

He sighed and, that time, couldn't bring himself to lie for her sake. "I don't know, love," he admitted, wrapping one arm around her and rubbing her arm, not only to soothe her but also to warm her.

The air around them was freezing cold over being utterly laced with the Dementors' presence. From the spot where he stood, Sirius didn't even dare looking up to see them floating over their heads, sucking any good feelings inside them with their bare presence – just the feeling of having them around, even at a distance, made him feel sick, like he was being pulled right back into his Azkaban years and, even worse, made him wonder if he wouldn't end up right back there before the clock hit twelve that night. The whole scenario just seemed too horrifyingly 'perfect' for sadistic creeps like Voldemort and his pals to skip on. Something told him that, sooner or later, there would be a cell at that black hole with his name on it.

The thought made him gulp heavily and, for the hundredth time since they'd surrendered, he tried to come up with an escape strategy… only to find himself faced with none again: they were literally surrounded by a wall of Death Eaters, their wands had been confiscated until 'further notice' and there were new anti-apparition charms all over them. They were rats in a cage, for all that was worth. It killed him to know that.

"… _found this one wondering around the woods_," Sirius suddenly heard someone saying nearby, making him turn in the direction of the voice only to see a beefy bloke pointing his wand at what appeared to be a Weasley twin's back while he addressed a Death Eater named Yaxley.

Sirius gulped and looked around the crowd for confirmation that Fred was still among them, hoping, really hoping he'd managed to sneak out at some point only to be captured again, as opposed to the other scenario in his head. That wasn't the case, Sirius quickly concluded by spotting the joke-shop co-owner's presence between Angelina Johnson and Lee Jordan several yards away as they aided Molly Weasley in caring for those who'd gotten injured during the fight, oblivious to what was taking place yards away.

That could only mean the one they'd captured was George, which brought up quite the question for him and Mia – if George was over there and he'd been the last person see with Izzy, what had happened to her in the meanwhile?

By his side, Mia, certainly mirroring his thoughts, gave him an uncertain look but didn't say a word. He just grasped her hand in return.

"_Ah, another ginger one. A Weasley brat, no doubt. That makes seven with the one covered in pustules upstairs_," Yaxley's voice said before addressing George directly. _"Got lost, boy?"_

"_Not really. I was looking for a place free of scum but you seem to be everywhere these days," _Sirius heard George replying.

"_Quiet_," the beefy bloke said, prodding George with his wand in a threatening manner. "_What do I do with this wise-arse's hide? Someone ought to teach him a lesson. Can I…?_"

"_You have your orders until _he _comes, Beadle. Just confiscate his wand and stock him with the others,_" Yexley replied before looking at George. "_Next time you want to make an escape, genius, try to use your wand instead of your feet._"

"_I'll keep that in mind_," George replied dryly.

Non-amused, the beefy bloke named Beadle gave the redhead a hard push towards the group Sirius and Mia were included in and walked him there at wand-point, complaining under his breath about their orders, whatever they were.

"A pleasure to meet you too, mate," George said after the beefy bloke gave him one last push that landed him right by Sirius's side. "An endless pit of joy, that one," he mumbled under his breath in annoyance before turning to Sirius. "I've got to say this isn't quite the situation I'd expected to find when I came back for the rest of you. I was thinking of something more along the lines of a battlefield…"

"What happened to Izzy?" Sirius asked him, ignoring the younger man's observation

George huffed, obviously still frustrated. "She's fine. I took her home," he replied. "She didn't take it too well. Wanted me to haul her back here so she could help you…"

For the first time that night since the Death Eaters had shown up, Sirius's lips curled into a little smile. "That's my girl."

"So the house is safe, then?" Mia asked. "They didn't try anything over there?"

George shook his head. "It seemed quiet enough to me. I didn't spot any suspicious character around or anything. I saw her getting in and everything…"

Relieved, Mia closed her eyes for a moment and sighed. "Thank you," she told George. "Thank you for getting Izzy out here. Just the thought of her being here in the middle of all those curses flying around…"

He shook his head, knowing he'd gotten Isabelle out of there for purely selfish reasons. "It was nothing," he assured Mia before turning to Sirius. "What happened here, anyway? How did they get us so fast?"

"Have you seen how many of them are out here?" Sirius asked in reply, his tone still full of frustration. "There are just as much in your parents' place searching every inch of it – about three for each one of us. We never stood a chance – they had us five minutes into the fight and all we could do was laying down our wands before they started trying to whack people instead of just injuring them."

"Wait, 'started trying' to kill people? You mean they weren't trying already?"

Sirius shook his head. "Not really. The worst I saw flying around here was the Cruciatus curse – not that it's a particularly good sign, anyway but at least there were no killing curses, from what I saw. If you asked me, I'd say the Death Eaters had orders not to really aim to kill as much as to hurt and capture… And something tells me they're not happy about it," he said, noting the looks of pure boredom and annoyance in many of Voldemorts' minions faces.

George nodded. "Well, that explains Mr. Niceguy's temper over there," he said, nodding at Beadle. "The bloke kept complaining about something under his breath… couldn't quite catch what it was but he did mention something about having to answer to 'half-blood scum', whatever it was."

"Half-blood scum?" Sirius repeated, confused. From what Harry had told him from his lessons with Dumbledore, Voldemort himself was as half-blood as they came, although he'd always tried to keep that fact away from common knowledge. But certainly none of his supporters, no matter how stupid or how cocky they might be, would ever dare to think of their master as Half-Blood Scum. Odds were he'd know right away and have their heads mounted on the wall or something equally gruesome.

"They do seem to be waiting for someone to come," Mia offered. "I heard that one… Yaxley, I think, reminding that other man of his orders before someone was to came. Who do you reckon it is? You don't think it's…" she paused, gulping "…actually _him, _do you?"

Sirius shook his head. "I think that, if he was ever planning to show up, he wouldn't have missed the 'fun' part when curses were flying all over. But let's hope not, in any case," he admitted. "Last thing we need is that one's presence added to the mix."

"And what about… out favourite Seeker?" George asked, purposely lowering his tone and avoiding Harry's name. "I take it he's not around at the moment."

"Gone with the usual two," Sirius replied, sighing. "Although our surprise guests still think one of them is right over there in the house suffering from a certain highly infectious disease. They're avoiding him like the plague."

The redhead had to grin proudly. "Yeah, I gathered they found the ghoul. Some of our best work, mine and Fred's. Took us weeks to make it realistic but it was worth it."

"It was a brilliant idea," Mia admitted with a sigh. She wished covering Harry's escape would be as easy as Ron's…

George huffed. "Any news from how Mad-Eye…? I mean, the Patronus really did say he… or did I mishear it?"

Sirius shook his head. "You heard it right. And we haven't heard anything since. Neither about that nor about how they finally managed to take the ministry down. It's just a bloody mess and we're right in the middle of it."

"If you asked me, I'd say the world has really hit rock-bottom today," George agreed, his tone more serious than ever. "Well, I'd better go check on Mum and the others," he announced. "Oh, and, before I forget, when you see Izzy, tell her she can be pissed off all she wants. I'm not sorry."

Mia gave him a little smile. "Don't worry – she doesn't usually hold a grudge for very long," she assured the younger boy with a little smile before he walked away and she turned to her husband. "What now?" she asked, feeling a bit lost. She wasn't used to that. Having to remain in one place, powerless against the threat breathing down their necks. If there was a fight, she'd ideally fight it. If there was a problem, by Merlin, she'd try to solve it. But now there were dozens of problems she saw herself unable to try and solve and a fight they had already lost. It was disconcerting at the very least.

"Now we wait," Sirius simply replied.

And they did. But at some point, the wait seemed endless. Seconds felt like minutes, minutes like hours, hours like days. The Dementors' presence didn't seem to help that feeling fading – in fact, minute by minute, the air seemed to get colder and everyone's moods gloomier. It just served to remind them of their condition as prisoners and, for the first time since she had gotten Sirius back, Mia allowed herself to believe she could actually understand how twelve years in Azkaban surrounded by Dementors felt like. If what she felt at the moment was even a fraction of what Sirius's reality had been like all that time, she just couldn't grasp how he'd managed to make it back to her. She was sure her sanity would have broken in there after a year, at the most.

Overwhelmed, she wrapped one arm around Sirius and was satisfied when he responded by holding her close. If Voldemort and his crew planned, in any way, to send Sirius back to that place, Mia thought, she'd willingly die fighting them before she let them do that ever again.

"_Black… and Black_," a voice suddenly called behind them, nearly making Mia gasp and jump in startlement. She turned around to see herself facing some golden-haired Death Eater she'd never seen before.

"What?" Sirius barked back.

"Your presence is required in the house," the man insisted in a bored tone.

"What for?" her husband insisted.

Annoyed, the man narrowed his eyes. "No questions. _Now, _Black," he said, starting to reach for his wand and promptly pointing it at both of them. "Don't make me go over there and fetch both of you."

By Sirius's side, Mia carefully eyed her tense husband and saw the unsure look on his face, like he was trying to figure out what their best shot was: staying and paying the consequences or going and finding out what they had planned for them… it was almost certain that they'd have to go through the second, in any case. He looked at Mia as if asking for her opinion and she gave him a little nod, mouthing 'we're together on this'.

It was only then that, firmly holding Mia's hand, he took one step forward, towards the waiting Death Eater. "Fine," he mumbled.

Two other men joined the blond one to escort them to the house and, for each step they took, Sirius and Mia couldn't help feeling their heartbeat raising.

What the hell could be awaiting them? Questioning? Torture? Death? Not knowing was the worst part, since it allowed their imaginations to head in the most gruesome directions. There was just no limits to nastiness when it came to Voldemort.

When they reached the Burrow's back door, which usually led to an always comfortable and familiar environment, they felt like they were about to step into hell in whatever form it had chosen to take for them. The golden-haired Death Eater knocked on the door and, when it opened, a more familiar one stepped out – Alecto Carrow.

"Ah, look who we have here, Amycus," the woman said in a taunting tone before her twin brother stepped out of the Burrow behind her. "Our former prison-mate."

Amycus's face became covered with a mocking smile too. "How's life going for you, Black? Heard you fathered a bunch of brats – can't wait to meet them."

Sirius's whole body tensed even more. "What is _that _supposed to mean, you bloody bastard? If you get ten feet close to any of my kids, you'll be dead before you know it."

Both twins made mock-scared faces. "Oh, Black is threatening us. Maybe we should hide," Alecto said before someone behind them cleared his throat and spoke.

Spoke in a very familiar and very unpleasant voice. "I'm afraid you'll have to leave the small-talk for later – we're on a schedule here. Just bring them inside and leave," Severus Snape said before the Carrows, clearly displeased, shifted their positions in order to open a passageway between them into the house.

But neither Sirius nor Mia took a step – they just stood there, frozen. Neither of them had seen their former co-worker since he'd betrayed them and murdered Dumbledore. The nerve, Sirius thought. The nerve that bastard had not to stay hidden in his little hole.

With his arms crossed and a slightly impatient look on his face, Snape appeared at the end of the passageway the Carrows had created. "Forgot how to walk, Black?" the man asked. "Because I'm sure we can make you remember."

"You son of a bitch," he mumbled under his breath. If he had a wand on him… If he stood a chance at all…

"Sirius," Mia said in a concerned tone. "Let's just…" she nodded her head towards the door and gave his hand a little tug before starting to walk towards it. Her husband followed her but tenser than she'd ever felt him and perfectly silent. Like a bomb about to explode.

By the time they were already standing in the Burrow's kitchen, Mia made sure she and Sirius stood at a safe distance from Snape, who was busy signalling at the Carrows to leave.

"I still think we should be part of this too," Amycus stated. "Help loosening their tongues, if you know what I mean."

"Well, it was me the Dark Lord gave the task of questioning them to, not you," Snape told the other man. "This is one of those times when it doesn't matter if you trust me or not – our Master does and his opinion is the one that counts."

Amycus sneered and locked his jaw before turning on his heel and walking out of the room with his sister on a tow, locking the door behind him.

Just as soon as he found himself alone with them, Snape gave Sirius and Mia a hard look. "Sit," he commanded, pointing at the chairs by the table.

"We'd rather stand," Sirius hissed. "We don't sit with traitorous murderers by principle."

Snape gave him an angry look. "Don't push it, Black. I'm willing to make this easy for you if you also make it easy for me – time is too short to waste with your little games."

Sirius didn't move an inch and just stood there with his arms crossed.

Frustrated, the former potions master turned to Mia. "Amelia, I strongly advise you to remind your husband that there are much worse ways for me to get him to sit. And I really don't mind using them on someone who keeps _wasting my time_."

Alarmed, Mia turned to Sirius and gave him a pleading look. "Let's just get this over with, Sirius. Please."

He remained immobile for several seconds but, taking in the look on Mia's face, ended up giving in. "Fine," he mumbled, towards one of the chairs and sitting down as Mia took the one by his side. "Happy?" he asked Snape, who stoically sat opposite them. "Let me ask you a question before you have a chance with yours. Do you get a kick out of it? Being a double-faced bastard? Murdering Dumbledore, the only bloke on this planet with enough faith to even consider trusting you? Getting good people like Lily and James killed? That's right – we know it was you who blabbed about the prophecy to your precious Master… who put a bull's eye on their heads. Trust me, if I had my wand on me, you'd be dead for it by now."

"Where's Potter?" Snape asked, promptly ignoring Sirius's accusations.

"What? No answer?" Sirius replied sarcastically. "Guess you really are a soulless piece of crap."

The death eater's lips pressed hard together, forming a very thin, tense line before he reached for the wand in his robes and pointed it at Sirius who just sat still, making an effort not give his nemesis the pleasure of showing him any hint of fear. "If you think your little accusations matter anything at this moment, you're very wrong, Black. So tell me right now and don't make me ask you a third time: Where. Is. _Potter_?"

"We. Have no. Idea," Sirius replied in the same tone. "And, let's be honest, if I did, which _this time_ I really don't, you'd be the last person I'd spill the beans to. I'd sooner die at the wrong end of that blood-covered wand of yours than do it."

"I'm sure that could be arranged," Snape replied.

"Sirius," Mia hissed, her tone shaky.

"It's the truth," her husband said.

Snape narrowed his eyes and pulled the wand away just a little. "Let me get this straight: neither of you," he said, looking between Sirius and Mia, "know where Potter is?"

"We don't," Mia confirmed.

"You really expect me to believe that? That Potter just left without saying a thing? _Left you behind_ without a word of where he was going?"

"Believe what you want – it's the truth," Sirius told the former head of Slytherin.

"Hum," Snape mumbled thoughtfully, reaching into his robes with his hand. "Then I suppose it wouldn't make a difference for you if one of you drank this," he declared, removing a small glass bottle from his robes. "Veritaserum."

Sirius narrowed his eyes at the other man. He couldn't say he hadn't seen that one coming "So you say. You don't think I'm stupid enough to just go ahead and drink anything you feed me, do you? That's poison, for all I know."

"I suppose you'll have to try your luck, Black."

"I suppose we'll have to test how badly I'll beat you without a wand," he said in reply.

Snape let out what seemed to be an annoyed breath and pointed his wand at Sirius again. "Black, shall I remind you that there are two associates of mine right outside that are not half as patient as I'm being right now? You wouldn't believe the lengths they're willing to go to in order to get you to drink this. Maybe I should fetch them for this."

"Knock yourself out," Sirius replied, putting on his bravest front. "It's pretty pathetic, though, that you find it necessary to fetch your palls to help you subdue an unnarmed…"

Snape made a quick move with his hand causing a flash of red to come out of his wand and, before he knew it, Sirius was being thrown out of his chair and flying back until the nearest row of cupboards, causing a pile of plates standing on the counter to fall with a breaking sound into the sink.

"Sirius!" Mia shouted, jumping to her feet in a fraction of a second and running to her husband's side.

"I'm fine. I'm fine," he quickly told her, despite the sharp of pain on his shoulder-blade, which had taken most of the fall against the cupboard. He was pretty sure nothing was broken or dislocated, though… or at least he hoped it wasn't. Still, it didn't hurt half as much as his pride, which only motivated him to glare at Snape in a defying fashion like he barely felt bothered. "Really, Snivellus, if this is all you've got…"

By his side, Mia let out an angry sound. "Enough, Sirius! This is not the place or the time for you two to poke each other like you're still at Hogwats!" Mia told her husband, completely out of patience for his and Snape's antics as she helped him up to his feet and then back onto another chair. "This is _enough_," she said before looking sternly at Sirius and then at Snape. "Just give _me_ the potion and be done with it, Severus. _I_'ll drink it."

Sirius turned to his wife, his face covered in shock. "What? No way! Are you insane, Mia?"

"It doesn't matter," she said, sitting back down. "We don't know where Harry's gone – no potion is going to change that. And besides, they're not letting us out of here until he gets to question at least one of us and there are worse ways for him to get the truth than Veritaserum," Mia said before turning to Snape. "Am I wrong?"

"You were always the wise one out of your little duo," Snape commented dryly. "So if it's settled, then, will you do the honours, Amelia?" he said, handing the little vial to Mia, who started uncapping it. "I have more of it, in case you're wondering if you can get away with spilling…"

"Don't," Sirius said just as Mia finished uncapping the bottle, grabbing her arm before she had a chance to drink, ignoring the burning pain in his shoulder. "_I_'ll do it, then."

Snape gave Sirius a little sadistic smile. "The expression 'if you snooze, you lose' is crossing my mind right now. Your wife accepted to take it first – you lost your chance, Black."

"Oh, screw y…"

Snape pointed his wand at Sirius again. "Back. Off," he slowly ordered, receiving a defying look from Sirius in return. "We have been very nice to you so far, Black – we have orders to give you a chance, after all, for all the honour a pureblood is due, regardless of his respect for his blood status. That might not last, though," he said, looking threateningly right into Sirius's eyes.

"Sirius, it's okay," Mia said, using her free hand to nudge his hold away from her arm. She couldn't let her husband turn that into a fight. Not when he was unarmed. Snape was right in one thing – so far the Death Eaters hadn't been as bad as they could have been and it would be stupid to provoke then into giving that up without a properly conceived plan in their sleeves. "It's just veritaserum – it won't hurt me," she assured him, hoping for her own sake it was true.

Looking his wife in the eyes as she nodded encouragingly, Sirius finally let go although he could still feel the terror in his mind drumming in synchrony with his heart – all of a sudden, the dull ache on his shoulder became like a tickling feeling as opposed to his fear for Mia. Trying to use every last bit of control he had in him, he turned to Snape and glared some more. "That had better be all it is – veritaserum."

"If you used your brains for anything but childish purposes, Black, you'd see how dumb it would be for me to kill either of you before getting to question you," Snape simply replied before turning to Mia again. "Well?"

Mia gulped before lifting the vial and stopping right before it touched her lips. "I'd cheer for your heath, Severus, but that doesn't seem so fitting when the purpose of this potion is to be honest in the first place," she commented before finally drinking it. She'd taken Veritaserum before – one time in her sixth year during potions class when they were studying it that particular potion. In her memory, its taste had had quite an intense flavour – sweet to the point of being sickening. That time, though, it didn't quite live up to her memory: the taste was still very sweet but not as much as she recalled it. Maybe her memory was tricking her but the liquid didn't seem quite as thick either when she swallowed it. Odd.

Several seconds passed in silence as Sirius looked at her expectantly, gripping the hand that he'd grabbed at some point she couldn't recall. It was almost like he half expected – and fully feared – she might drop dead at any moment, poisoned by the former potions master.

"Are you okay?" her husband asked.

She turned to him fully intending to respond in an affirmative fashion but what came out wasn't quite what she'd planned. "Of course I'm not. But that's obviously not because of the potion," she heard herself saying.

Sirius gave her an odd look in return but seemed to settle down, just patting her palm under the table with his hand in a soothing fashion.

"Brutally honest, I see. Well, it must have settled already, then," Snape concluded in a careless tone. "I suppose we can get started." He cleared his throat before asking the first person. "Are you Amelia Davis Black?"

"Yes," she replied.

"What kind of question is that? Are you too mentally defected to recognise her now?" Sirius asked in confusion.

Snape glared at him. "Certainly not as much as you are to ask that question. I'm sure I'm not the first person to tell you about a certain potion that can give you someone else's appearance. Now be quiet, Black or else I might consider having you stunned until I'm done questioning your wife. I'm sure you'd like that."

Sirius pursed his lips together but held his tongue. The last thing he wanted was to leave Mia alone at that creep's mercy.

"Do you know where Harry Potter is?" Snape inquired.

"No, I don't," she replied.

"Really?" Snape said. "He didn't give you a single hint of where he might go?"

"No," Mia told him.

"Hum," the former potions master mumbled. "Do you have any way to contact him?"

"No, I don't." And, in her mind, she thanked Merlin the watch she'd give Harry only went one way when it came to keeping contact – that left her enough room to omit without lying.

"Are you aware of any meeting settled with him? To be somewhere at some specific date and time?" Snape continued.

"No," she replied. "What are you people doing with us after this questioning is over?"

"I'm the one asking the questions, Amelia," Snape simply replied. "Was Potter ever here today at this… gathering, whatever it was?"

Mia hesitated. "Yes, he was at the wedding." Keeping it hidden didn't really matter anymore. Harry was long gone.

"Hum… interesting," Snape said, raising an eyebrow. "See, I was told by my… associates that many people had sworn they'd never seen Harry Potter around here today."

That time, Sirius couldn't hold his tongue. "I'm sure I'm not the first person to tell you about a certain potion that can give you someone else's appearance," he declared, mimicking the other man's earlier words exactly.

The former Slytherin just glared at him but decided to ignore Sirius's intervention before looking back at Mia. "So, he was here hidden under Polyjuice Potion?"

"Yes," Mia replied.

"And is he still here? Hidden under someone else's form?"

"No. I've already said I don't know where he is," she said, starting to feel frustrated.

"And when did you last see him, exactly?"

She sighed, recalling the last time she'd laid eyes on her godson. "A few minutes before the Death Eaters arrived… he was in the marquee," she answered. "After that, he was gone."

Snape just nodded and then checked his watch for the time. "One last question," he stated, looking back at her. "Can you think of any other reason why Potter might have left today besides escaping capture?"

Mia gulped and felt her skin chilling. It hadn't occurred to her he might ask that question. It simply hadn't. That was the one question knew the exact answer to and, despite knowing it was impossible under Veritaserum's influence, she simply couldn't answer truthfully. She couldn't take away from Harry the one step he had ahead of Voldemort – hunting down the Horcruxes while the dark lord remained oblivious to the fact Harry knew about them in the first place. She couldn't do that to Harry, she thought, closing the hand she did have connected with her husband's into a hard fist.

"Well, Amelia?" Snape insisted.

"Mia…" Sirius started to whisper.

She gulped another time. She could try and stay silent – Veritaserum could make her be truthful when she spoke but it couldn't make her speak on its own. There were other ways for Snape to get her to speak, though, ranging from unforgivable to the tamest blabbing jinxs… One way or another, she was set to end up giving Snape an answer and, the longer she took, the more determines he'd be to get it out of her. So, despite knowing she stood no chance, she tried with all her might to lie. And when her voice came out, she did. "No," she managed to say in a strangled tone.

"I'm sorry, I didn't get that," Snape said.

"I said 'no'," Mia repeated in a louder tone, barely managing to hide how amazed she felt at her ability to lie. How was it possible under veritaserum when she hadn't taken any of the so-told shady antidotes for it circulating in the Black Market? How the hell had she lied? "I can't think of any other reason."

Her former colleague eyed her for a second. "Are you sure, Amelia?"

She met Sirius's eyes for a moment before answering and could see small, almost unnoticeable signs of surprise on his face. He was clearly trying as hard as he could not to give her lie away. "Positive," she replied, looking back at Snape as she gained a bit more confidence in her unbelievable ability to lie.

Snape observed her for a few seconds with a thoughtful look on his face but seemed to just give in after a while. "Very well," he mumbled, leaning back against his chair. "I think we're done here. I should probably warn both of you that if, by any chance, Potter returns and you don't turn him over, you'll be committing the crime of harbouring a fugitive from the ministry's own wanted list. Named by the Minister itself."

"Now that's something I can't picture Amelia Bones doing," Sirius replied.

"Amelia Bones was relieved on her position, Black, haven't you heard? She's right up there at the top of the wanted list with Potter. Pius Thicknesse is the new Minister."

"With your beloved master pulling the strings as the puppet master, I imagine," Sirius asked sceptically. "In any case, what, may I ask, is a school-aged kid doing in the ministry's wanted list?"

"Potter is wanted for questioning concerning his role in Albus Dumbledore's death," he replied calmly.

Both Sirius and Mia eyed the man in disbelief. "That's absurd!" Mia yelled. "You, more than anyone, know everything there is to know about Dumbledore's death since you're the one who murdered him! You know it. _We _know it. The world knows it."

"The world knows what Potter told them," Snape said, his tone not letting any feeling by.

Sirius shook his head slowly, full of disgust. "You really are the worst excuse for a human being I've ever had the displeasure of meeting," he said.

"My heart is breaking, Black," Snape replied sarcastically.

"That's rather hard since you don't seem to have one in the first place," Mia replied furiously. "How can you just sit there and tell us so calmly you're letting a seventeen-year-old boy be implicated in a murder _you _committed? How? Lily was the only decent friend you ever had and all you did was mistreating her son. Now you want him captured and, by obvious extension, _dead_ – like it doesn't mean anything she gave her life to save him. Lily would be disgusted to see what you've become, Severus," she told him, her voice more full of hate than Sirius had ever heard it.

"_Don't_ speak of her," the man said through his teeth. "Don't speak _for_ her."

Mia shook her head. "I've got every right to speak for her because this is exactly how she'd feel. She was my best friend… she was as good as a sister to me. I raised her son for her."

"She was my friend first," Snape replied before he could help himself, immediately regretting them.

"Then it's a pity you didn't cherish that because when you had Lily Evans as a friend, you had everything," she told him and, by Merlin, from the look on his face she could tell he knew she was exactly right. It only angered her more. "You had a second chance at doing good for Lily through Harry and you blew it. You blew it so badly, Severus."

Snape didn't speak, just kept his lips pursed together in anger for several seconds at the same time his hand clutched his wand so hard it might snap. For a moment there, Sirius could almost swear an actual feeling other than anger crossed his nemesis' face – pain… regret, maybe… It just didn't make any sense. If the man still had any sense of loyalty to Lily, how could he be paving every step of the way leading to Harry's potential death? It would be simply sick.

"Out!" the men bellowed after a few seconds, by the time it looked like he might just curse the life out of them.

"What?" Mia asked.

"I said get out, Black! Both of you! We're done here," Snape declared angrily, not sparing him another look as he started to scribble something on a piece of parchment he'd apparently just fetched along with a quill from inside his robes. "Go outside and join your little friends," he added in disgust. "We'll deal with all of you in a little while."

It was with the question of what Snape meant by 'dealing with all of them' in her mind that Mia stepped out of the house with Sirius by her side and was escorted back to where the rest of their friends were huddled together, still waiting to see what was going to happen to them. Night had fully fallen by them, leaving it up to just a few garden torches to serve as sources of light, which made the whole thing seem even more menacing. Up on the sky, the Dementors were barely visible, only giving themselves away when they occasionally passed in front of the shrinking moon.

"Mia," she suddenly heard her husband whispering by her side as they walked, two Death Eaters watching only a couple of steps behind them. She turned to him to see him eyeing her with a confused look on his face. "In there… You…"

He didn't need to finish the sentence for her to be sure he was referring to her lying. "I know," she simply replied.

"How…?"

"I don't know," she truthfully said.

"Oi, yeh two! Quit whisperin'," one of their guards demanded, closing the distance he still had behind them and giving both of them a shove, to which Sirius reacted with a grunt.

Yaxley, who seemed to still be guarding the group of captives, frowned at seeing them being brought back. "Re-joining us so soon?" he asked.

"What? Disappointed they didn't have to drag us here on stretchers?" Sirius replied dryly.

"Can't say I'm not," Yaxley replied, surprisingly honest.

Several faces seemed to be surprised at seeing them back so soon and so apparently unscathed – truth was even Sirius and Mia themselves were surprised at it…

"Are you two alright?" Remus immediately asked in concern just as he and Tonks reached them.

"Just peachy," Sirius mumbled in a frustrated tone. "Anything happen in our absence?"

"Nothing major," Tonks replied. "They questioned a few people, kept on searching the house… What did they want from you in there? We were going mad imagining what they were doing to you in the house… we were already putting a plan together with the Weasley boys…"

"Cause a distraction, maybe steal a few wands and try and get you out…" Remus filled in.

Mia shook her head. "Trust me, you weren't the only ones expecting the worst but it turns out they just wanted to question us under Veritaserum…"

"And you won't guess who they sent to do it," Sirius added, absently rubbing his still aching shoulder.

"Snape?" Remus guessed.

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "What?… How…?"

"_Attention_!" Snape's voice called behind them, making everyone turn around to face him and easily solving the mystery behind Remus's guessing.

Sirius and Mia turned around to find most Death Eaters seemed to have gathered in front of the Burrow's door, firmly flanking Snape, who stood one step in front of them. Killing Dumbledore seemed to have caused the former Potions Master to rise into a high position in Voldemort's hierarchy, yet the looks of disgust many of the other Death Eaters gave him behind his back showed he hadn't quite earned all his peers' respect.

"The Dark Lord has requested I passed a message on to all of you," the man announced when he was sure everyone was listening, his voice a monotone. "We are not your enemies."

"_Yeah, right_," Sirius mumbled to Remus, who just remained silent in return. An echo of many whispers filled his ears, coming from various sources around him – Sirius didn't seem to be the only one sceptical to that statement after all the killing Voldemort had been responsible for. One had to be mentally retarded not to see the irony…

Ignoring the voices, Snape cleared his throat and continued. "Putting order back into the Wizarding World is all we seek as well as correcting… misgiven ideas that seem to have been spread lately concerning starting with this one: there is only one enemy to the Wizarding World and that person is _Harry Potter_."

More and louder whispers filled the air, underlining the disbelief in everyone's minds. Clearly, Snape had picked the wrong crowd to preach to. Yet, once again, the man ignored them.

"It is Potter we are after and not all _rightful_ witches and wizards in general. The Dark Lord cherishes Wizarding Blood and does not wish to see it uselessly spilled or wasted."

And the purest it was, no doubt, the most 'cherished' it would be, Sirius quickly guessed. No doubt a blood cleansing was on the way – it had, after all, been Voldemort's plan from the beginning.

"That is why," Snape continued, "as a token of his mercy, our master has requested you were harmed as little as possible today and set free to go home to your families."

The feeling that came after that statement was bittersweet for Sirius and Mia – the relief of knowing they were going to make it home was undeniably marred with suspicion for the reasons why they were being let go. It couldn't be that easy, could it?

"_However,_" Snape added, promptly turning to Sirius and Mia as if reading their minds and issuing them a direct warning, "_any and all _individuals or organizations proven to be directly aiding Potter, communicating with him in any way without properly informing authorities to help arranging capture or hiding his location and plans will not be extended the Dark Lord's mercy. They will be tried and they will pay with no less than an extended stay at Azkaban. _No tolerance_. On the other hand, all information concerning Potter's whereabouts and plans or about anyone aiding him will be properly rewarded with the Dark Lord's generosity."

On her spot, Mia's hand reached for Sirius's. It was no surprise they were out to get Harry – hearing it straight, however, added a whole other edge to it.

"You can consider this your second chance at proving yourselves faithful to the Wizarding World's rule and you might find it useful to rethink your allegiances. Rebellion will _not_ be tolerated," Snape declared, before turning to the Death Eaters and giving them some sort of signal that had them starting to disapparate away. As his peers made their exits, Snape waved his wand and a series of wands came out of one of the Burrow's windows, each making its way to its owner. "Consider yourselves warned and do trust you'll hear from us again soon," Snape warned one last time before vanishing as well.

**A/N: Well, hope you guys liked it! Feedback is really welcome! Review!**


	48. A Changing Game

**A/N: Well, yet another chapter here. It almost wasn't posted today - I have a very important exam tomorrow. The last one! Hopefully, I'll be off to grad school afterwards!**

It was fully dark when Sirius and Mia apparated right in front of their home followed by Remus and Tonks, several hours having passed since Bill and Fleur's wedding had been ruined by the Death Eater's sudden appearance.

Everyone was rather numb, unsure of where to go from there, now that the ministry had been taken over by the dark side of that war. And with the Weasleys being among the most shaken up of all, having had their home invaded, every member of the Order reached the silent agreement that they'd leave any joint-efforts for some sort of resistance planning for another day.

Still, though, any prospect of just returning home and pretending for one night everything was fine was unrealistic. Everything was changing and they were all lucky they'd been allowed to go back home that night at all. If everyone had already been in constant danger before, it had only gotten worse now that Death Eaters had free reign over Wizarding Britain. The need to discuss the events that had taken place in the past few hours and maybe figure something out of all the question marks filling their head was just too much – and clearly Sirius and Mia weren't the only ones feeling that way since, when they had suggested Remus and Tonks came over so they could try and figure some of it out, they hadn't wasted a second before agreeing with them.

"Home sweet home," Sirius mumbled under his breath as door opened after he'd tapped his wand on the lock. The house was awfully quiet and dark but not in a bad way – for some reason, that was actually a relief for them after the insane mess they'd just been put through at the Burrow.

The four of them stepped in in a hurry, wanting to shield themselves behind the thick wall of wards that the house offered, and Remus, as the last one to enter, closed the door firmly behind them.

Before any of them could even utter a word, though, Lulu came hurrying from the stairwell leading down from the basement kitchen, a very unusual look of anxiety on her face. "Oh, finally," she said as she started to make her way to them, Gabe quickly joining her. "Are you alright? Are you hurt?"

Mia shook her head. Lulu wasn't like her when it came to worrying – it took _a lot_ to get her mother in that state, she knew. "We're just fine, Lu," Mia assured her. "Exhausted in many ways but fine."

Lulu sighed in relief. "Well, what's going on, then? Izzy showed up hours ago saying the ministry had been taken over and that there were Death Eaters at the Burrow. Gabe tried to go there but couldn't get anywhere near…"

The older man nodded. "They were just starting to put up a massive wall of wards. A minute earlier and maybe I'd have manager to infiltrate…"

Mia shook her head. "It wouldn't have made any difference, Gabe. You were better off outside."

"What do you mean? You can always use one more in a battle."

Sirius huffed as he hung his coat. "You'd have an excellent point there if the battle had lasted more than five minutes."

"What?" Lulu asked in confusion.

"We had to stand down," Tonks provided, her hair now showing a dull brown tone instead of the vibrant auburn one she'd worn at the wedding. "Didn't stand a chance, numbers-wise. Or in any other way, for that matter, given their current position," she declared with a stressed sigh as Remus, trying to offer his wife some comfort, placed an arm around her waist. "They took the ministry and got the upper hand. And Mad-Eye…" She pursed her lips together and her face visibly paled, unable to cope with her former mentor's fate.

Her husband cleared his throat. "Why don't we head upstairs, Dora? Maybe we can hear some news on the radio… find out what's happening out there," he said, mostly just looking to get a few moments alone with her.

Sirius nodded from where he stood. "Yeah, you two go along and make yourselves at home. We'll meet you there in a few minutes," he urged them.

Giving his friend a short thankful nod in return, Remus gathered his wife and guided her towards the stairs so they could walk up to the first floor together as they spoke in hushed tones.

Alone with her husband and parents seconds later, Mia sighed and turned to face her mother, who still looked uncharacteristically tense. "Where's Izzy now?"

"Downstairs in the kitchen," the older woman replied. "She fell asleep waiting for you by the fireplace. That is, after she nearly dug a hole on the floor with all the pacing she did while waiting. A kid her age has no business worrying herself into exhaustion." She didn't say that in an accusation fashion but instead like she was just stating a fact. A fact that showed just how wrong a state their world had gotten itself into.

Sirius pursed his lips together in a frustrated fashion. At least, he thought, his daughter hadn't been in the Burrow at the Death Eater's mercy as he and Mia had… That alone would have been enough to get him to do something stupid like plotting some sort of poorly planned escape that definitely wouldn't have led anywhere good. "We couldn't get away until now. We figured you'd have closed the floo connections, anyway," Sirius stated.

"We did for any incomer but you two," Gabriel replied. "Just in case you needed to use it."

"But how did you escape from there, anyway? Tonks said you had to stand down," Lulu stated. "Seems unlikely that they'd just let you go…"

"Well, believe it or not, they did," Mia responded.

At her parent's incredulous looks, she and Sirius proceeded to give them a short account of what had happened at the wedding after the two of them had left, starting with the moment when Kingsley Shacklebolt's patronus and ending with Death Eaters's exit, led by Snape. By the end of it, it was clear Lulu and Gabe found the Death Eater's behaviour just as odd as everyone who'd witnessed it first-hand had.

It was only when they heard the old clock in the library announcing it was midnight that they realized how late it was and, despite their insistence for Lulu and Gabe to stay the night just in case, the older pair quickly made up their minds to go back to their own flat, with Lulu, back to her own no-nonsense ways, pointing out that, unless a battle was taking place in the middle of their living room, she and Gabe would be just fine on their own.

"She's as stubborn as a mule. They'd be safer with us!" Mia said with a huff, just after her parents apparated together from the house's front steps. "I know they have good wards at their place but…"

"The Burrow's wards were broken today," Sirius finished for her.

Mia nodded. "Do you think we're safe here? I knew they don't seem to be out to get us for now but if they change their minds…"

Sirius sighed. "Look, as much as I hate even the memory of my father, I have to admit that, thanks to him our wards are probably the strongest in the country after Hogwarts'. I'm pretty sure he was paranoid enough to have made sure the wards would have protected him even against his own side's precious dark magic if they ever turned on him. I'm sure we'll be fine, love."

Her husband's words relieved her a bit and she deeply hoped he was right about what he'd said. Now that Death Eaters were free to use their dark magic without having to worry about answering to anyone, only Merlin knew how far their ability to break so many families' protection could go…

Recalling their daughter's whereabouts, the pair made their way downstairs to the kitchen, where they quickly spotted Izzy, snoozing clad in pyjamas on one of the armchairs by the fireplace, her neck bent in an awkward position that was bound to cause her trouble in the morning.

"You think we should wake her?" Mia asked.

Sirius shook his head. "Let her sleep. I'll carry her upstairs," he said, quietly approaching his oldest daughter's sleeping form.

"But your shoulder…" Mia said, reminding him of his little flight against a kitchen cupboard at the Burrow little more than an hour before, courtesy of Snape, to his own annoyance.

"Barely feel it now, love," he said, moving it to prove his point, yet noting it felt more than a bit stiff, which he promptly ignored as he picked his daughter up from the armchair.

Just as she felt herself being carried, a half-asleep Izzy mumbled a few words of protest under her breath. "No. I want to wait for them," she said.

"We're already here, Izzybel," her father replied. "Go back to sleep."

Doubtful at first, she hazily opened her eyes and let out a relieved breath when she realized her father was the one carrying her, promptly letting her head fall against her father's shoulder and obliging by going back to sleep.

By the time Sirius reached Izzy's room little more than a minute later, his shoulder stung, protesting the effort of carrying his daughter's weight, yet he made an effort to hide it in order to avoid a well-deserved 'I told you so' lecture by his wife.

"Is the shoulder okay?" Mia asked, noting the tense look on his face after he'd placed their daughter on her bed and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead.

"Hum-hum," he replied, nodding stiffly. "I'll just go upstairs and check on Alex and Mary." _Maybe find some bruise cream for the damn shoulder too,_ he thought to himself.

Shaking her head as she watched her husband walk away, she allowed herself to give him the satisfaction of pretending she believed checking on their kids was all he was going to do. No doubt his pride was bound to ache more than his shoulder, simply at the thought of having let Snape, or all people, wound him, Mia thought, making her way to Izzy's bed in order to pull the covers over her.

Izzy immediately stirred, though, hesitatingly opening her eyes and shielding them with one arm against the light coming from her bedside lamp.

"Mum? What it time is it?" she asked, yawning tiredly as she shifted her position, plopping herself against a few pillows.

"Far past your bed-time, young lady," Mia replied simply.

Izzy gave her an annoyed look. "I'm not a little kid anymore, Mum."

"No, but it doesn't mean your body doesn't require a decent night of sleep," her mother said in return. "It's past midnight, honey."

Oh her spot, Izzy sighed and looked around for a moment. "Where's Daddy? He was here just a while ago, wasn't he?"

Mia nodded. "He went upstairs to check on your brother and sister. Probably to nurse his wounded pride too…"

"Hum?"

"Long story, sweetheart," she said.

"Oh, okay…" Izzy said, rubbing her eyes. "Did everyone make it okay tonight?" she hesitantly asked, hoping not to get bad news as an answer.

Mia let out a tired breath before sitting on the edge of her daughter's bed. Now more than ever, 'okay' was a relative notion. "Everyone is fine, honey," she informed her daughter

Izzy eyes her mother suspiciously. "Are you sure?" she asked.

Her mother nodded. "Yes. No one got very hurt. A few minor curses. Some cuts and bruises… nothing that can't be solved."

"So _everyone _is okay?" she asked one more time.

Mia raised an eyebrow at her daughter's insistence, guessing there might be more to it than the question itself transmitted. "Are you asking about someone in specific?"

"No!" she replied, all too quickly, immediately looking away from her mother.

"Izzy," Mia pressed, reading right through her. "If it's about Ginny or Luna or any of our friends, they all seemed okay too. Scared but okay. Mostly everyone is: Remus and Tonks, the Weasleys…"

That caught the younger girl's attention, making her look back at her mother, though forcing herself to do it showing as little eagerness as possible. "So… I take it George made it back just fine."

Mia raised an eyebrow softly. "Yes, he did," she answered slowly. George, she thought, slightly intrigued. Something in the way her daughter had asked about him, so forcefully casual, fully reminded her of her teenage self, struggling with accepting her feelings for a certain boy with her daughter's eyes. "You know, it was a very… noble of him to get you to safety before anyone else, Izzy."

Izzy felt her cheeks redden at that and looked at away again. She was still annoyed at George and yet, there she was, being all girly about him 'saving her'. Like she couldn't have handled herself through a battle. "Funny, I seem to see classify entirely differently in my mind…"

Her mother sighed. "Yes, he shared that with us. He also asked me and your father to tell you that you can be angry all you want because he's not sorry."

Izzy sighed and sunk down to a more horizontal position, arms crossed in a pouty-like fashion. "He really is an idiot," she mumbled, rolling onto her side, facing away from her mother, whose look was too knowing for her taste.

Mia smiled a little as she pulled the covers over her daughter. "They always are," she said, softly caressing Izzy's long dark hair and allowing herself to think that everything was normal for a moment. To think that she was just a mother talking to her daughter about boys… that she didn't have another child out there on the run, but instead pretending to sleep in his bed as any seventeen-year-old boy should in a regular Summer night.

"Mum?" Izzy said again, turning back to her after a few seconds. "Was it really bad out there? Why did it take you so long to come back?"

Mia sighed, quickly decided that was not the time to inform Izzy of the whole ordeal at the Burrow. Instead, she gave her a short, softer version of it. "It could have been worse, honey. We'll talk about it in the morning. Now go to sleep. You can see you're tired."

She was, Izzy thought, so she didn't really bother to protest. Her parents were okay and her friends too… she could live with just knowing that for now. "He's probably okay, you know? Harry. I saw Hermione apparating away and bringing him and Ron along. The three of them are together, so they're gonna be fine… they always are."

Mia gave her a little smile. "I hope so," she replied before leaning down and kissing her daughter's forehead. "We'll talk in the morning, honey. Good night."

"'Night, Mum," Izzy said in reply.

And, with that, Mia turned off the bedside light and got up, only looking back once before walking out just as her husband was already making his way down the stairs. "Everything okay upstairs?" she asked.

Sirius nodded, much more comfortable now that he's managed to at least partially heal his own shoulder before having checked on his youngest children. "The little ones are out like lights," he replied. "The wedding seems to have drained them both. What about in here?" he asked, nodding at Izzy's room.

"She woke up. We just talked a little," Mia said, taking a deep breath as her eyes landed on the door leading to Harry's room. It was the oddest feeling – somehow she'd imagined it would be harder, letting him go, but, between the ministry getting taken over and the Burrow being invaded, she'd realized he was better off staying underground than staying with them. As much as she already missed him, his safety spoke louder. "Where do you think he is?"

Sirius shook his head. "I don't know. I don't _want _to know in case those bastards find it fitting to question us again. Today was too close, Mia. Too damn close."

"You don't think I know that?" she replied, huffing. "I almost blew everything. From answering that question truthfully to revealing Harry knew about the Horcruxes… it was just a little leap. I could see myself ruining Harry's chances right then and there."

"Well, you didn't. You held yourself over there and managed to lie against all the odds," he said, wrapping one arm around her waist as they started making their way down to the floor below in order to join their friends. "If being determined to protect Harry and his mission had anything to do with that… well, not even I would have done any better – no one would."

With that reassurance in their minds, the two of them resumes making their way down the stairs. When they entered the living room, they found Remus and Tonks sitting by the table where the radio rested, the first patting it repeatedly with his wand as he tried to try and find a working station in one of the magically controlled frequencies, yet only getting alternated sounds of silence and static out of the device.

"Anything?" Sirius asked as they joined them.

Remus shook his head. "Only Muggle stations," he told them, putting his wand away as he gave up on finding any news about what was happening to their world. "Ours seem to have gone completely silent."

"And I don't think this time the saying that 'no news are good news' applies," Tonks added with a weak sigh while absently stroking her belly with the thumb of the hand resting on it, as if she was trying to seethe the child inside, still far too small to know what was going on outside. "Odds are the Death Eaters have already taken over the stations and are using that to keep the news of the takeover from spreading and buy themselves some time to set their game up."

"It seemed pretty set up to me at the Burrow, if you asked me," Sirius commented dryly, taking a seat at the sofa, followed by his wife. "Bloody bastards might as well have captured us all."

"Sirius!" Mia scolded. "We're lucky they let us go!"

"I know we are, love. I'm just saying that it would have been less confusing if they hadn't. When bad guys don't stick to only doing bad things, it usually means they're up to something," he explained.

"Sirius has a point there," Tonks agreed. "They wouldn't have let us go if they didn't expect to get something out of it – I mean, they could have very easily taken a number of people at the wedding hostage to lure Harry back, yet they didn't. I'm not sure what they're planning… maybe they just trying to trick us into giving their rule a chance although that's unlikely… The point is that they're being unpredictable and that's not good for us."

Remus nodded in agreement. "Still, we can be sure of something: catching Harry is still their number-one priority, now that they have the ministry. They were clearly expecting to find him at the wedding. Thankfully, when they shattered the wards, they also gave him the quickest possible way out through apparition. I imagine that's how he managed to escape," he concluded.

"Yes, Izzy just told me she saw Hermione side-along apparating him and Ron out of there," Mia offered.

"Hum, so by going after him, they provided Harry with a quick way out," Sirius said. "Good. That's got to sting for them."

"Yes. But it was also a risk they had to take," Tonks pointed out. "I mean, no one was going to just let them walk through the wards as guests. Not even under disguise – the Weasleys were very cautious, despite everything, using every way from wand-inspection to passwords to confirm people's identities. Their only way in was by breaking the wards. Badly. I can only imagine the amount of Dark Magic they must've used to do it."

"Yeah, well, I don't imagine they were at all bothered by that since apparently now they have no one to answer to but their lovely Master who's admittedly the dark arts' number one fan," Sirius replied bitterly. "I can't even begin to imagine how badly they'll turn the wizarding world upside down now that they're in power."

"Yes, no doubt in the morning there will be a pile of new laws being applied," Remus agreed. "And no doubt they won't benefit any of us even slightly."

"Hopefully people won't settle for it since Bones is still out there. For all intents and purposes, she's still the real minister," Mia pointed out.

The werewolf sighed. "Maybe… But it's clear they will paint her as an enemy. Plus, people will be scared. We all heard Snape's speech – resistance is not tolerated. Many won't even consider risking it just to protect themselves and their families. Not until the Death Eater's rulling gets to a point when it's too oppressive to ignore. And it will, sooner or later."

"So, basically, now we have two big things to worry about: whatever the hell the Death Eaters decide to do while they're in power and Harry being on the run. And let's not forget whatever else comes up because it always done," Sirius concluded. "Things are just building up to become a toxic mess of huge proportions."

"You can say that again," Tonks agreed, getting up from the chair she was sitting on, which was becoming painfully uncomfortable to her beyond tired body, and occupying an empty armchair by her husband's other side. No doubt in the morning the baby would take its revenge on her for driving herself to near-exhaustion by sending a boatload of morning sickness her way. "Anyway," she said, changing the subject, "you never got to sharing what had happened when Snape questioned you. You mentioned Veritaserum… did he use it on both of you? And did he manage to get anything out of you?"

Sirius and Mia's eyes met for a moment before the latter answered for both of them. The thought of how close she'd been to messing it all up for Harry, no matter how much Sirius assured her it wasn't her fault, still made Mia's whole body chill. "He only questioned me. I offered, actually, since Snape and Sirius were too busy knocking heads together like two little kids over the veritaserum and it was clear Snape would never let us go before he got to question one of us at least," she said, turning to glare at her husband for a moment.

"Look, I'm sorry, Mia. I guess I went a bit too far but that bastard deserved every verbal blow he got," Sirius said. "He killed Dumbledore. He's after Harry, for Merlin's sake."

"No one's questioning that," Mia said, admitting to herself that, had she known at the start of the questioning how far Snape was out to get Harry, she might have been the one pushing too far before the questioning instead of afterwards. "Anyway, I…I suppose it didn't go as badly as it could have…We didn't really give Snape anything that could help them finding Harry – he was careful enough not to tell us where he was planning to go in case something like this happened. Still, there was a moment there… he asked me a question that I knew the answer for but… look, I'd tell you what it was about but we promised Harry…"

Remus immediately shook his head in understanding. "I think this afternoon had already proven that there are some things we'd better not know about."

Tonks nodded in agreement. "Just go on, Mia."

Relieved they understood her point, she did so. "Well, Snape asked a question that I knew the answer to but I couldn't give it to him because it would harm Harry. So, when I was supposed to answer, I… I lied."

Remus and Tonks just stared at her for several second. "Lied, lied or… somehow misled him while still telling the truth?" Tonks asked just to be sure.

"Lied, lied," Mia confirmed. "As in denying knowing something when I actually did know it. Just like that."

"That… that's not possible. Not under veritaserum," Remus stammered. "It defeats the whole point of the potion. I mean, there are brews that can counter the effects but I highly doubt you had any of these lying around."

"She didn't," Sirius confirmed. "She just lied. I heard it with my own ears. It was unbelievable." He turned to Tonks, then. "You deal with Veritaserum a lot at the Auror office, don't you? Did any of this ever happen to you?"

Tonks shook her head. "Not really. Just flatly lying without a counter-potion… I never heard of it. But I suppose, in theory, it's not _completely _impossible. Not if the Veritaserum had been brewed incorrectly – it's a very temperamental potion when it comes to brewing. Its effects could be severely compromised just by stirring it the wrong way once or throwing in an ingredient out of the established order. That's why it always needs to be tested before used. Just a couple of days ago we got a new batch of Veritaserum at the office and had to try it before approving it for official…"

"Wait, you went around testing an unapproved potion while pregnant?" Remus asked her in alarm.

"What? No. Do you think I'm mad?" she said, instinctively bracing her arms around her still very flat stomach. "I never said _I _tested it. The usual procedure is that we write our names on a piece of parchment, throw them into a box and leave it up to luck. Yet," she added when she saw her husband, once again, giving her a panicked look, "no one ever writes their own names in. We all have a silent agreement to always write Dawlish and Savage's because they're idiots. Oh, the amount of things I could tell you about them…"

Remus raised his eyebrows. "And Kingsley just lets you get away with that?"

She shrugged. "Just as long as his name doesn't come out, he pretends he doesn't even know it," she said. "But, anyway, Veritaserum is a tricky potion to brew. True, Snape is an excellent potion-maker but I suppose even he could make a mistake, especially when he's too busy sucking up to his precious master to properly measure his ingredients or whatever else he messed up."

"It did taste a bit… watery," Mia admitted.

"Well, there you go," Tonks said. "The potion probably wasn't strong enough to completely block your mind from lying."

"So, all in all, we owe it to Snape's sloppily brewed potion that Mia managed to lie," Sirius concluded, sounding slightly disgusted. "I'm not sure I like that…"

"Regardless, you should be thankful for your luck," Remus point out. "Getting a dose of badly brewed Veritaserum from a Potion Master is highly unlikely. Everyone can make mistakes but still… the odds had to be very low."

Tonks raised an eyebrow, recognising her husband had a point there. "You don't think he did it on purpose, do you? For some twisted leftover sense of loyalty or something…"

Sirius gave her an incredulous look. "You're joking, right? He hates Harry's guts, Tonks. And he's proven which side he's on by killing Dumbledore. I can't think of any reason why he'd even consider helping us."

Mia sighed. "Sirius has a point there. Severus had lost every sense of loyalty he could have possibly harboured for our side. He's even letting Harry be implicated for Dumbledore's Death, for Merlin's sake! That's beyond forgiveness. As much as I'd like to believe there had to be some good in him for Lily to ever consider him a friend, I just can't anymore."

"Wait, Lily Potter was friends with Snape?" Tonks asked in confusion.

"Practically a lifetime ago," Remus simply replied. "They had a falling out in our fifth year – never made up again after it… it was a sore subject for Lily afterwards."

"Hum… never would've…"

Before she could finish her sentence, though, Tonks was interrupted by a sudden sound of frantic banging on the front door of the house, which had them all jumping to their feet in alarm.

"Are you expecting someone?" Remus asked, already reaching for his wand cautiously.

"Guests at bloody midnight, Moony?" Sirius replied, equally alarmed.

Mia gulped. "You don't think it could be Dea…?"

"Death Eaters don't usually knock, love," her husband replied.

"They do when the front door is the only way in," Tonks pointed out, already stepping into auror mode. "Maybe we should stay here. I'll go check."

Remus raised an eyebrow. "How about I go instead? In your state you shouldn't…" He stopped talking, though, when he saw his wife drilling a hole between his eyes with her glare.

"Excuse me?" she asked in outrage before pointing at herself. "Me – trained auror," she declared, promptly pointing at Remus afterwards. "You – joke-shop manager slash accountant slash part-time babysitter for the twins. How does that make you more qualified than me to go down there and make a recon?"

"You're forgetting the former DADA teacher slash member of the Order part in what comes to me and the pregnant part in what comes to you," Remus added as there was another bang on the door.

"Oh, I'll give you the pregnant part…"

"Dear Merlin, you're like ten-year-olds fighting over a broomstick!" Sirius impatiently said. "My place, so _I_'m going. Feel free to follow if you'd like, as long as you get it together." And, with that, he promptly exited the room, making his way down the stairs while mumbling something under his breath about people saying _he _was the one always acting like a big kid as Mia and, seconds later, Remus and Tonks joined him.

The banging got louder and louder as they approached the door and actually seemed to grow frantic. It didn't cease until Sirius approached it enough to ask who it was.

"_It's Kingsley Shacklebolt_," the person on the other side replied.

Puzzled, Sirius turned around to face the rest of them just to see they looked equally confused, Tonks quickly stepping ahead of everyone.

"What on Earth would he be doing here?" she asked, surprised at her boss' alleged presence.

"No idea," Sirius replied. "You ought to as _him_ not me," he said, nodding at the door.

And so she did, stepping closer to the door and clearing her throat. "Kingsley?"

"_Tonks_?" he replied in recognition. "_What are you doing in there?_"

"I should be the one asking _you_ that," she replied, rolling her eyes. "Is it really you?"

"_Is it really…What sort of question is that! Don't tell me you're going to make me review identity-verification procedures with you through a door, Tonks! Get it done!_"

"Fine! Let me think… What did you tell me at the end of the first day you spent as my trainer?"

There was a moment of silence on the other side of the door as the man seemed to be thinking. "_That you'd either end up blowing yourself to pieces because of your clumsiness or become one hell of an auror despite it._"

"You never did give me a follow-up to that statement," she replied.

There was a moment of silence. "It's still to be seen but so far you haven't blown yourself up, have you?"

On their side of the door, Tonks had to roll her eyes before she gave Sirius a nod saying it was okay to open the door. Holding his wand out just in case there was some nasty surprise outside with Kingsley, Sirius reached for the doorknob and pulled the door open, allowing the large, dark-skinned man to step into the house, quickly closing the door behind him.

"I'm afraid I need to take Potter," the man announced, quickly skipping the greetings before any of the others could say anything. "He needs to be placed in a safe-house and remain in hiding for the time being."

"Kingsley…" Mia started, being unable to finish as the man interrupted.

"I know it's not a pleasant arrangement, Mia, but things are too unstable now for Potter to completely rely on your protection alone. You-Know-Who and his people are clearly out to get him now more than ever," the head-auror explained. "So, where is he?"

"Harry is not here, Kingsley," Remus supplied for them all.

Kingsley frowned. "What do you mean he's 'not here'? Didn't you get my warning before the Death Eaters came? Did he get captured? Do they have him now?"

Mia shook her head. "No. It's none of that. He just… Harry left."

"You mean he ran? From the Burrow, that is, to escape the Death Eaters?"

"Yes… and no," Sirius told him. "It's hard to explain… let's just say him leaving isn't exactly news for Mia and I, although we didn't exactly plan for it to happen mid-invasion. The point is that he's gone now and he managed to escape those creeps, Kingsley. And, before you ask, no, we don't know where he went."

"Merlin…" the auror mumbled. "So this was planned?" he asked, receiving a nod in return from Mia. "What is he doing out there?"

"We can't tell you that," Sirius replied. "It's not that we don't trust you, it's just… we made a promise. The most we can tell you is that he's on a mission."

"A mission?" the man asked in return. "From Dumbledore?"

"A mission," Mia simply said.

And, following, that, came a long moment of silence, during which all of them mused about Harry's mission, some knowing more about it than others. It was only when Tonks cleared her throat that the silence was broken

"What exactly happened at the ministry?" she suddenly asked her boss. "In your message you said it had been taken over, that Mad-Eye had… There's just no way, right? It's Mad-Eye. Faking his death would be like taking breakfast for him. He once called it the ultimate way of going underground…"

The look Kingsley gave her after that said everything and Tonks suddenly went very pale. "I'm sorry. I saw them hauling off his body… maybe trying to cover it up. They definitely didn't want anyone to see it. But I could tell… he was gone."

"How?" Remus asked, taking a step forward and wrapping an arm around his wife's speechless form.

"He was personally protecting Bones's office – we found a cursed object in her mail last night. It had already passed through most of the security checks so we figured it was an inside job and Moody thought they might so straight to her office and mine it with curses when they figured the package hadn't reached its destination. But then the Death Eaters came and took the place over awfully fast – they had much more people under the Imperius curse than I'd initially thought… they even got to Proudfoot. In my own department, for Merlin's sake."

Tonks gave him a disbelieving look. "You're kidding. You checked us all over for mind-control yesterday!"

"I did," Kingsley confirmed. "It appears they got to a lot of people last night. Anyway, after they had most of the building under their control, they went to Bones' office probably trying to find her there but instead they found Mad-Eye. Word around was that he'd given them quite the fight before they…" He paused and gulped, unable to say it because it sounded so unreal. "From what I heard, he cursed the hell out of Rookwood, cracked a bunch of Bellatrix's ribs… pretty much left Nott eating from a straw for the rest of his miserable life if he makes it out alive. One of the Rosier brothers wasn't so lucky to survive."

They all went silent for a moment after Kingsley's description. Mad-Eye, of all people, gone. The bloke who'd lost more body parts than any of them could guess cheating death.

"He went fighting like he'd have wanted to," Sirius sombrely said, breaking the silence.

"And took at least two of commission," Tonks said, trying to wipe the wetness from her eyes before tears could start running freely. "The old idiot would have found it a victory, believe it or not," she declared, already sniffing. "Bugger, he'd never let me hear the end of it saw me crying for him. Can't seem to help it these days."

Sighing, Remus wrapped one arm around her and she buried her face on his chest, silently weeping for her late mentor's end as her husband just rubbed her back.

"Well, not sure if you heard but at least Bones managed to escape," Sirius declared.

Kingsley nodded. "I know – Dedalus Diggle contacted me after he placed her at a safe-house. From what I heard, she's already trying to figure out a way to get through to her international contacts and ask for their support. Some had already offered asylum if it turns out to be necessary but that's as far as they're willing to go…"

Mia nodded. "Last time around, they also hesitated in intervening in the war. They were afraid Vol…"

"Don't say his name!" Kingsley shouted before she could finish.

Sirius gave him an odd look. "Oh, for Merlin's sake, what's the point on fearing the name at this point?"

"It's not that, Sirius! They've made his name a taboo," Kingsley explained.

Tonks immediately pulled away from her husband and stared at her boss. "What? That's insane. Taboos haven't been used since the Middle Ages."

"Apparently now they decided to bring them back," the man replied.

"Wait. What exactly is a taboo? In that sense of the word, that is," Mia inquired in confusion.

"It's a spell – a very dark spell," Tonks explained. "It has been banished for centuries – barely known around civilians these days. Rumour said the Department of Mysteries had even found a way to completely eradicate it but apparently they were wrong… Basically, the spell jinxes a word and whenever somebody uses it, it sets off a series of alarms."

"Like the trace does when underage magic is used," Remus concluded.

"Only it's worse," Kingsley explained. "It gives away the speaker's location, destroys any wards protecting them… basically, it leaves them completely unprotected and ready to be captured. It's extremely dangerous. It's safe to guess that everyone captured over activating the taboo won't be judged in a valid court…"

"But why Vol… the V-word?" Sirius asked, barely stopping himself in time. He really needed to get a hang of his tongue or else he could cause a tragedy.

"Because anyone with the guts to say it has enough to potential to become a threat against their regime. Basically only us in the Order use it," Tonks said before looking back at Kingsley. "Are you sure it really is a taboo?"

Kingsley nodded. "Sturgis Podmore managed to spy on the Death Eaters from under an Invisibility Cloak Mad-Eye had loaned him – he heard them mentioning it. They said someone on Tottenham Court Road had activated the taboo by uttering their master's name. I have no idea who – by the time they were allowed us to go home, no one had been captured, so I guess, whoever it was, escaped. We're already spreading the word about the taboo but people are bound to slip sooner or later."

"Is there any way to shield us from it?" Sirius asked.

"Only one as far as I know," Kingsley said. "The Fidelius Charm. The taboo may still give away your location but the charm will keep anyone from actually finding it and will probably keep the wards under wraps. It's a very extreme measure, though. You'll want to think twice before using it because, I'm not sure if you realize it, but it would basically lock Harry out unless you have any way of letting him know about the secret."

He had a point there, Sirius thought. The Fidelius charm would leave them completely protected but, at the same, it would put a wall between that house and Harry if he needed to come back sometime before the end of his quest. True, if the kid was smart, he'd stay away from the house just for the sake of being underground but still, there was no guarantee he wouldn't need their help one of these days…

"Maybe we can find a way around the taboo," Tonks suggested. "Some sort of selective silencing charm or object… like profanity blocks. Mum threatened me with those a lot… I'm pretty sure it was something she just made up to scare me but the idea is basically that."

"It does sound like something worth trying," Remus agreed. "In fact, it actually sounds like something the twins would be interested in creating… maybe I could mention it to them…"

"I guess we'll just have to hold our tongues for now," Sirius said. "But if we don't find anything else… Let's be honest – the baddies are bound to come for us sooner or later. Eventually they'll get tired of chasing after Harry and will want to use us as bait, so sooner or later we'll need to hide behind a foolproof barrier of wards. Sooner or later we'll need the Fidelius charm. Not just us – everyone intending to fight back."

"Yes, Sirius has a point," Kingsley agreed. "The Death Eaters won't always keep their game clean – or as clean as they're keeping it for now. We have to be prepared to go underground too at some point. They have the upper hand now – the game has changed."

"So, what do we do until then?" Mia asked, uncertain of their path through that new reality that the ministry's takeover had created. "Wait and see?"

"No. We hold out end of the fight for Harry," Sirius replied.

Kingsley nodded. "Yes. Because if Dumbledore meant what I thought he meant when he called Harry out best, all our fates are in his hands from now on."

**A/N2: Well, I hope you liked this one :D Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	49. Exile

**A/N - After some really bizarre glitches with the updating tool (anyone noticed them too? No spaces in bold and italics upon uploading chapters, parts of sentences missing...), I give you a new chapter. I apologize for the long delay but the admission process to grad school was really exhausting though, as of a few hours ago, I'm officially a grad student! Classes start next week, so wish me luck. **

**Anyway, this is a chapter mostly from Izzy's POV. I hope you like it since it's really long with 10k+ words... I'm nuts, yes.**

**Note: There are references (though no intentional quoting aside from a sentence from a Daily prophet Article) from Chapter 11: The Bribe of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.**

**20 August 1997**

Nearly three weeks passed since the Ministry had fallen to the Death Eaters and no news came… or at least not the ones anyone inGrimmauld Placewas the most anxious for.

In a way, that wasn't a particularly awful thing on itself, Izzy thought from time to time, more often than not trying to convince herself of it. Logic dictated that the first thing the Death Eaters would do if they ever got their hands on Harry would be shouting it out loud to the skies so the whole world could hear about their victory. And, since the only mentions of her brother in the news for the past weeks had either involved articles trying to solidify his new condition as the 'crazed and dangerous Undesirable No.1'or publicizing the increasing bounties on his head, it was pretty clear they were nowhere closer to finding him than they'd ever been before.

So, Izzy asked herself, when logic was so perfectly… logical, why did the human mind ever so stupidly insist on ignoring it for the sake of slowly cooking in a pool of simmering anxiety? She supposed that was up for the mind healers to figure out…

Regardless of what experts might have to say, in the midst of that constant shadow of worrying, they'd fallen into what she would classify as an isolation-based routine. She'd wake up and come down to breakfast only to find her mother scanning every single inch of the Daily Prophet for a little clue of what Harry might be up to. Later, her father would come down too and scan the papers some more, rarely finding any sign of Harry's potential doing between all the incident reports – and, then, to lift up the moods in the room, he'd find some less horrifying article to crack a bunch of jokes about, such as Dolores Umbridge's surprising appointment as the Head of the Muggle-Born Registration Comission a few days before ("_Wonder how she'll manage to serve as a head to anything when the blokes at St. Mungo's are convinced she's left hers at the Forbidden Forest after that little centaur incident last year_…" Sirius had pointed out that time).

Afternoons tended to vary a little but not much, as they seemed to be predominantly stuck inside the house. Truth was, they didn't really have many reason to leave it, anyway… The Weasleys remained 'unvisitable' due to the Burrow's new set of blood-based wards, which, while very powerful, seemed to lock out everyone not directly related to their casters, Arthur and Molly (a fact that the couple was incessantly trying to find a way around since, unpleasantly enough, not only did make their friends and allies unable to step into Weasley property, but also members of the family lacking in Weasley blood, such as the newly married Fleur Delacour…).

At the same time, circulating around public places, Wizarding or Muggle, was becoming increasingly dangerous as the number of 'mysterious disappearances', especially among opponents of the new regime (as well as their families), kept spiking, which made the simple act of paying a visit to the local playground an equivalent to scouting enemy territory – something had to be very wrong with the world when, last time they'd left the house, all Izzy could focus on while she watched her father pushing Alex on the swings were the facts that his eyes never stopped darting everywhere in suspicion and that he always kept a hand in his pocket, no doubt clutching his wand in it just in case. Even she, who knew she wasn't supposed to do magic outside of school, had been nervously gripping her own wand that day while sitting with her mother and baby sister on a park bench, not quite enjoying the feeling of being outdoors as much as she should have.

To put it simple, Izzy could see herself being slowly driven mad by that routine, since nowadays being inside or out were starting to become equally unpleasant scenarios. And what sucked the most was that there wasn't really a third option… At least, she thought, in a handful of days she'd be headed to Hogwarts and, although prospects of the school year ahead of her was essentially a giant question mark, she'd have her friends around over there – that was bound to create a more pleasant routine.

But, in what came to routines, that day's had, for once, been different in many ways. And not particularly in a good way. It started with her mother, as well as the newspaper, being missing from the breakfast table, where Izzy had solidly found them every morning for the past three weeks whenever she came down to the kitchen at that time of the day. Kreacher had also been out of sight that morning, the only sign of his presence being the recently cooked breakfast food resting on the kitchen counter… but then again, that wasn't all that odd since he'd been pulling a lot of disappearing acts in the past few weeks – Izzy supposed he was depressed over not having Harry around or something although, whenever she asked, he'd always insist she shouldn't worry about him.

Kreacher's disappearances aside, she might have let her mother's odd behaviour slide if her father, at least, had showed up by the time she was almost finishing her plate, as he always did. But he didn't – none of them did. By the time they did come down, and only after her younger siblings had cried bloody murder over their parents' apparent disrespect for their own routines, they had acted even more oddly, looking awfully tense and constantly avoiding answering her questions concerning what was going on. The newspaper remained missing and Izzy figured it probably wasn't a coincidence. Something _had_ happened.

Maybe Harry had been spotted somewhere – surely if he'd been caught, she'd know it already. She had no doubt her parents would have shown a much more alarming behaviour if something _that_ bad had happened. And, following that train of thought, she deemed it safe to assume that whatever was going on didn't involve anyone particularly close to them being killed or captured. _Okay_, she thought. Whatever it was, it wasn't good news… but at least it couldn't be the worst either. She was sure she could handle that… so why the hell were her parents being so annoyingly secretive?

Through the rest of the morning, she asked more questions and received more excuses in return, ranging from Mary needing a sudden and completely random diaper change to her father all of a sudden 'hearing' her mother calling his name from wherever she was at the moment – a call Izzy sure as hell hadn't heard.

After lunch, by the time the clock had hit three and her parents had gone back to their room in order to, for all she knew, resume discussing the mystery matter, she was fuming. They were hiding something from her. _Specifically_ from her, she was sure, ignoring how paranoid that thought sounded. It made sense for her at the time. And, as if it wasn't bad enough that they were all secretive, they weren't even doing a good job of hiding it! Honestly, it was simply insulting…

Pacing in the house's living room with her arms crossed against her chest in frustration, she decided she'd had enough. She was going upstairs, she was marching into her parents' room and she was asking what was going on. She wouldn't give them the chance to come up with any excuse that time – did they think she was five? Because only a kid that young would be fooled by the excuses they came up with. For all that was worth, she wasn't a little kid anymore. She didn't need to be coddled and protected from the harsh reality out there, even though everyone seemed to think so, she thought, her mind drifting momentarily to a certain redheaded person she was still kind of annoyed at.

Shaking her head for a moment and making herself concentrate in the matter at hand, she took a breath and headed to the door. She'd pick a fight if that was what it took for her parents to tell her what was going on – she didn't like it but she wouldn't put that possibility past her. Despite being far from the standard goody rule-follower, she'd never really been one to just cause trouble for the sake of doing so either.

She climbed the stairs quickly, only making an effort to do so more quietly as she approached her parent's floor, as well as the rooms where Alex and Mary would be napping in at that time of the day. Yet, just as she spotted her parents' door, she noted that, not only it wasn't fully closed but also they seemed to have forgotten to activate a silencing charm as she could clearly hear their voices. She didn't even think twice before deciding to overhear the conversation – they'd brought it on themselves, after all, with all that stupid secrecy.

_"… give it a day or two at the most before the letters arrive, booting us out. There's no way he'll let me stick around now that he's in charge. Not unless icicles start forming in hell,"_ her father was saying, his voice showing how frustrated he was.

"_I'm perfectly aware of that myself, Sirius. And, for the record, he isn't particularly fond of me either. Especially not after our last confrontation,_" her mother responded in a concerned tone.

They didn't speak for a few seconds after that, although Izzy could clearly hear someone pacing. "_Well, we can sum it all up, then, can't we?" _Sirius said._ "It's safe to say we can count on being kicked to the curb just as soon as the little bastard gets his hands on the Hogwarts seal. This changes everything_."

Izzy gulped at that. They were talking about Hogwarts, she concluded. Not bad news about Harry, at least. That was good, although the fact that, from what she could gather, they were convinced they were about to be sacked wasn't all that pleasant. She wondered why, though…

Her mother sighed audibly inside the room. "_I know it does. Seems like the world doesn't do anything these days but changing. And not for better. It's like it's turning toxic, isn't it? First the ministry, now Hogwarts… it's supposed to be a safe place, for Merlin's sake! It always was!_"

"_It isn't anymore. Not with them in there_," her father said. "_You know what we have to do… it's bad, especially now, but we have to do it…_"

"_Maybe we should wait to hear what Minerva has to say…_"

"_Do you really think anything she has to say is going to convince us that handing Izzy over to those creeps anything less than mad? She can't go back to Hogwarts like this!_"

She stopped thinking just as soon as she heard those words. "I can't what?" she heard herself saying out loud before she could stop herself, already stepping into her parents' room.

Her father's face immediately turned to her and her mother, who'd been sitting on the bed until then, stood up with a jump.

"Izzy, what do you think you're doing eavesdropping people?" Mia asked, looking at her with a frown.

"You tell me, Mum. This seems to be the only way to get answers around this house. What is this whole madness about? I can't go back to Hogwarts? Why on Earth not?" she asked in disbelief, looking between her mother and father.

None of her parents answered. Instead, her father reached for a folded newspaper resting on the dresser and handed it to her. "See for yourself, love," he told her.

And so she did. As soon as she unfolded the paper and spotted the headline, the conversation between her parents immediately started to make a whole lot more sense.

**_Severus Snape Appointed as Hogwarts Headmaster_**

_Severus Snape, long-standing Potions master at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was today appointed headmaster in the most important of several changes at the ancient school._

And that was just the beginning of it, she quickly concluded as she continued reading. The article proceeded to list a series of changes in Hogwarts's staff and admittance process, namely the appointment of Alecto and Amycus Carrow for the positions of Muggle Studies and DADA teachers. Alecto and Amycus Carrow, known Death Eaters of the nastiest sort, teaching _Muggle _Studies and_ Defence _Against the Dark Arts? There was no way – absolutely no way – that could possibly work out, Izzy thought.

And, as if that wasn't enough, the blasted article went on with stating that attendance was now mandatory to every admissible wizard and witch, a rule that, if broken, carried a punishment of no less than a decade-long stay in Azkaban for the parents of the pupil. Muggle-borns, however, were banished from attending the school.

"This is insane," she said as soon as she finished reading. "What about McGonagall? She's supposed to be the headmistress, not Snape!"

"We're still waiting to hear back from her," Mia replied. "For all we know, she's still part of the staff, or else the article would've probably said something about it."

"How can they possibly name Snape headmaster? He killed Dumbledore! Everyone knows it!"

"Yeah, well, the official version these days is that whatever happened on top of the Astronomy tower that led to Dumbledore's death is still to be determined," Sirius told her. "Still shocked we don't want you over there?"

She pursed her lips together and took a few moments before answering. "I think you're missing the point where attendance is _mandatory _for everyone who isn't a Muggle-born, which, in case you're somehow forgetting, Dad, I'm not_._"

Sirius shrugged even though he seemed anything but careless about the matter. "We'll find a way around it."

Izzy looked at him in disbelief. "A way around it? How? By going on the run?" she asked. Her fate was pretty sealed in her mind – she was going to Hogwarts. She had to… oddly enough even wanted to, despite what she'd just learned. The thought of her family ruining any chance at a relatively normal life because of her… there was just no way.

"Honey, we're still forming a plan in our minds," Mia said quietly.

"What plan? You two could be arrested if I don't go! What about Alex and Mary? Do you want them to grow up knowing their parents are locked up in a cage? Because, trust me, knowing that about a parent is bad enough on its own," she said, looking straight at her father as she added that last part.

"They can't toss us in any cage if they don't catch us," her father replied.

"And how do you suggest we make sure that happens, Dad? By confining us solely to this house from now on? You can't do that! It's _insane_!" she said.

"Insane would be to hand you over to those freaks on a silver platter!" Sirius replied in a louder tone.

"I'd rather have to handle twice as much of them than being the reason why you lose your freedom, either it is to Azkaban or to be confined to this house. You can't turn this place into a prison!" she replied in the same fashion.

"It will be one eventually, anyway! Don't you get it, Izzy? They will come after us sooner or later and when they do, we'll have to hide in here! Probably even use a Fidelius charm! This way, we're just anticipating it a little."

The thought of it made her throat go dry but, even so, she recognized the truth in her father's words – they were a target, as Harry Potter's family. Their freedom wouldn't last long, for sure… and, strangely enough, that only angered her more. "It's not fair! If our freedom's running out, we might as well enjoy it while they let us! How can you expect me to just stay home hiding like some… coward or weakling when Harry's out there facing it all? Ginny and I are supposed to hold the fort at Hogwarts. We, the DA… that's out mission! I can't just stay at home!"

"You can and you will! Do you have any idea how dangerous those people are? The Carrows – they get off on torturing people! What if one day they decide it's time to use you against Harry? You'll be right at their mercy and we won't be around to help you."

"I can help myself! My friends can help me there! What do you think the DA was? Some pastime? We're supposed to protect each other!" she yelled before turning to her mother, hoping for some support. "Mum…"

Mia sighed. "Izzy, it's just too dangerous…"

"It's dangerous to everyone! It's not fair that I stay home when everyone else has to go. It's not fair I back down from the fight when my friends can't! I'm not a weakling, I'm not stupid and, unlike what everyone seems to think, I can handle protecting myself!" She promptly turned to her father with an accusatory look on her face. "If you were in my shoes, you'd go back no matter what!"

"That is not the point!" Sirius told her.

"Oh, so it's '_do what I tell you, not what I'd do_' now, Dad?"

Sirius huffed, frustrated that she was right in pointing out the double-standard. But she was his daughter. She was his very first child and the last thing he wanted was to see her getting hurt – if her being really pissed off at him was what it took, so be it. "Yes, that pretty much sums it up, doesn't it?"

She pursed her lips together and gave her father a really furious look, breathing heavily with all the anger running through her veins. For a moment there – Sirius wondered if she was about to scream. But she didn't. Instead, and still looking like she could just murder someone, Izzy turned on her heel and stormed out of the room without a word…

He huffed by the time he could hear her angry steps climbing down the stairs and turned to Mia, who looked anything but pleased. "Don't look at me like that," he said.

"Like what?" his wife dryly replied.

"Like I'm an arse or something," he provided. "Maybe I am one but this time I think I have a right to be – all we're trying to do is to protect her – she's just too stubborn to go along. Trying to talk sense into her to accept is like hitting your head against a wall repeatedly."

Mia nodded slowly. "Yes. It must feel just like fighting with yourself, mustn't it?" she mumbled.

Sirius frowned at her words. "What is that supposed to mean?"

She sighed and shook her head. "Never mind," she said, exasperated as she made her way out the door, hoping to go downstairs and talk some sense into Izzy.

She'd barely just left the room, though, when the loud sound of a heavy door banging incredibly loudly reached her ears, making her freeze.

"What was that?" Sirius asked in alarm, rushing out of the room and walking up to the stairwell's rails, looking down to try and see something.

"I think it was the front door," she barely managed to mumble.

Her husband turned around in alarm. "She wouldn't go out on her own."

Mia gulped. "I think she just did."

She couldn't say she'd planned it – leaving the house had really been a spur of the moment thing. She hadn't been quite sure of where she was headed or even thinking now stupid it was to walk around on her own in a time like that. The only thing she'd known was that if she stayed at home another minute, she would suffocate. Maybe not literally, but still…

And, just as she hadn't planned to leave home, walking around without direction for several minutes, taking enough twists and turns for her parents not to run straight into her when they inevitably started searching hadn't been premeditated either. Same thing with entering the first underground station she'd found and using the Muggle money she'd found in her jeans' pocket (having been left there since the last time they'd left the house to go to the park and her father had insisted she always carried Muggle money around in case they needed to make some quick escape using non-magical means) to ride aimlessly in the first train that came her way.

It was only there, in the middle of all the oblivious commuters and likely in the last place where her parents would look for her, that she actually managed to calm down enough to get herself thinking.

She was just so angry and for so many different reasons! Everyone seemed to see her as some sort of weakling! Her parents, for Merlin's sake, seemed to be so sure of it that they were even willing to risk their freedom just for the sake of keeping her away from a fight she was sure she could handle… And the thought of having to hide away at home for Merlin knew how long – years, maybe! – made her feel sick. Not just because she wanted to be out there to fight but also because she already felt so damn lonely…

She missed her friends. She missed Harry, who was on the run with Ron and Hermione, she missed Ginny, who she hadn't seen since the wedding because she was stuck at her own place, she missed Luna, who… well, she wasn't really sure what Luna was up to but, then again, she was still too out of reach over at Devon when Floo travelling (seeing as the ministry was now keeping track of it) and apparition (far beyond her abilities) weren't an option. Who did that leave, then? Was that what was ahead of her through her forced exile at home? An endless feeling of loneliness? Because she hated it already.

_It's war, it's bad for everyone, not just for you,_ part of her said in her mind. She knew that. She wasn't so selfish that she'd think she was the only victim of the war. Merlin, there were bound to be people in much worse situations, namely all those Muggle-borns being made to register like cattle and treated by the regime even below that level.

It was all war. She hated it, she want it to be over, she wanted to help _making _it be over, not just sit around and wait for someone else to do that for her. And she sure as hell couldn't do it when everyone wanted to coddle and shield her from the big bad world. No one seemed to understand that but she needed to make them.

Before that, though, she quickly concluded, she needed to find somewhere to go as it finally occurred to her how stupidly dangerous it was for her to walk around on her own in a time when people mysteriously vanished every other day. Before, she'd been too lost in her troubled to care… Not home, though, she quickly decided. She wasn't ready to face her parents again yet, she thought, despite starting to feel a bit guilty when her mind drifted to what they might be thinking or doing at that very same moment. They must be freaking out…

She shook her head, unable to deal with that too yet. She needed to find somewhere to go and maybe let her parents know she was fine just for the sake of sparing them. The problem was that, as she'd already established, her usual go-to people were very much out of reach with Harry on the run and the Weasleys miles aw… She stopped herself. Not _all_ the Weasleys.

It was odd how often she forgot that, despite being Weasleys, Fred and George didn't live at the Burrow anymore, but instead in some apartment over their joke shop. And, being in Diagon Alley, that definitely put them within reach.

Despite that fact, she felt reluctant to go to them at fist since she was supposed to still be annoyed at George over his little knight-in-shining armour stunt at the wedding and her weird romantic feelings about him were still a bit… confusing, to say the least. On the other hand, she didn't have any other choice. It seemed the decision had made itself.

Looking up at the underground diagram over the train's door and recognizing the name of the station she recalled having spotted more than once near the Leaky Cauldron's entrance on Charing Cross Road, she was glad to conclude she was in the right line although, after a few minutes, she figured she'd apparently taken the train headed in the wrong direction…

Getting back in the right direction was a bit of an adventure even though it wasn't the first time she took the so-called 'tube' (albeit never alone) and it, as well as many other means of Muggle transportation, had been thoroughly covered in Muggle Studies classes. In the end, it was nearly half past four in the afternoon when she did manage to get to the Leaky Cauldron, which she had to consider a victory.

The pub was as badly lit and grubby as she recalled, although its costumers – much fewer than the last time she'd been there – seemed to have gotten way creepier. She could feel eyes on her as she quickly made her way to the back of the pub, anxious to reach the entrance to Diagon Alley and, from there, get to the shop. No one stopped her, at least, and, after tapping the correct bricks on the wall of the backroom with her wand, the passage opened itself to show her something much darker than she'd recalled.

Diagon Alley hadn't exactly been in great shape last time she'd been there with shops closing and people barely crowding it. But now… As she walked along the street with her wand firmly clutched in her hand, she counted at least three shops closed for each open one. The pet shop, the Quidditch supplies shop… even Madam Malkin's – they were all closed. There was broken glass and boarded up or newspaper-covered windows… and, of course, one couldn't forget the million posters of Undesired #1 lying all over the place. Bizarre. It didn't seem like Diagon Alley anymore – it was a ghost town.

By the time she spotted the joke shop at a distance, which seemed to be the only lively place in the whole alley, she'd crossed paths with six or seven people at the most, at least half of those having suspiciously exited the way she knew to lead to Knockturn Alley. It was truly disturbing. She even found herself wondering if there was even a way back from how low things were at the moment. For a moment there, as a chill hit her, she just felt like slumping to the floor and giving up. There was no hope for herself, her family or the world. They were doomed.

She stopped herself for a moment. What was she thinking? _No hope? Giving up? _Where had that come from? she managed to just barely wonder for a moment. It took her just a glance up towards the grey-ish sky for her to get the answer. Dementors floating all over the alley. _Just get the hell out of there_, she told herself, hurrying her steps as she rushed into the shop.

Just walking in felt like being welcomed into the warm, familiar arms of safety. Unlike the depressively grey outside, Weasley's Wizard Wheezes exploded with colour and joy. There were very little costumers for what she was used to but she could just say the dozen at the most people inside the shop were the bulk of Diagon Alley's shoppers. Good for them, she vaguely thought.

"Isabelle?" she suddenly heard George – she was just sure it was him, although later she'd ask herself how telling his and Fred's voices apart by just one word had become so easy – asking in surprise. Her eyes found him standing a few feet away, apparently restocking a shelf with products. At first, she could tell he was pleased to see her, although his expression slowly shifted to a suspicious one. "Where are your parents?"

She shrugged. "At home, for all I know." Lie. Big fat lie – as much as she tried not to think of it, she had no doubt that by then they must be looking for her. Worried sick. She needed to find a way to let them know she was okay – she might be angry at them but not that angry that she'd want them wondering if she was lying dead in some alley.

"Why, what do we owe the pleasure of your presence, Miss Black?" Fred asked, walking up to her with a grin, having just finished feeding a bunch of pigmy puffs.

She shrugged. "I was in the neighbourhood." Big fat lie number 2…

"Oh, were you?" George asked, sceptically. It was like he could see right through her.

"Well, you're always welcome among these parts," Fred stated, much more welcomingly.

"Sure," George slowly agreed before shooting Izzy a look. "Although we have to wonder what's really brought you here. _On your own_."

Fred poked his twin with his elbow, finding his behaviour utterly odd. "What's gotten into you now? Have you forgotten how to be a pal? No questions asked among friends."

"Yeah, I don't think that's gonna work this time around," he declared, still eyeing a very quiet Izzy. "Do you think you can handle the shop on your own for a while?"

Fred raised one eyebrow in return. "Oh, I don't know. With all this clientele lining up I might have trouble handling it," he replied sarcastically, although something in the way he looked at George revealed he'd caught on to something. Fred knew his brother too well.

George ignored the look, though, and just turned to Izzy. "Come along," he said before walking off.

"Where to?" she asked, although she was already following him, never having even hesitated.

"Where I take you to," he cryptically replied, headed to the door behind the shop's counter.

After they walked through it, Izzy saw herself stepping into a familiar cramped hall, containing a door to the left and a stairwell to the right, leading both to a basement area below them and the floors above, where she knew to be both Remus's office and the twins' flat. And speaking of the devil, she thought when, after hearing steps coming from upstairs, her former DADA teacher hurried down the stairwell, only stopping when he saw her there with George, looking at her in puzzlement. "Izzy, what are you doing here?" he immediately inquired. "Your father just sent a patronus over. They're looking for you everywhere!"

"Oh, are they?" George asked dryly. He'd known something was up. He'd felt it ever since he'd laid eyes on her.

Izzy ignored George's words, just focusing in her old teacher. "Will you tell them I'm here?" she asked, more as a request than as a simple question.

Remus eyed her in surprise. "Well, obviously," he said. "I'm not about to let them turn half of London over looking for you when you're standing right ib front of me." Part of him wondered what that was all about. His friend had hurriedly skipped through any details beyond the fact that his daughter had stormed out after some sort of argument. He supposed he should be glad that, even though he was on his way to fatherhood, teenage years were still more than a decade away…

Izzy's only response was a nod, relieved to know her parents would be told she was okay. She supposed now that she didn't have that to worry about, she could concentrate on what a pig-headed arse her father was being.

"Well, in the meanwhile before they show up, I'm taking Isabelle away for a little chat," George started, opening the door on the left and nodding at it. "This way, milady," he told her.

Izzy looked up and raised her eyebrows at the redhead for a moment before eventually giving in and just stepping into the unknown room, hardly noticing as her father's best friend made his way back upstairs in order to contact her parents.

As soon as she stepped in, she immediately concluded she was currently standing in the shop's stocking room. It was either that or a very messy and stuffed office.

There were boxes everywhere. Literally everywhere. On the floor, on shelves, on chairs, on _and _under tables… on some corner there was even a big messy pile of Christmas ornaments, somewhat mixed up with non-Christmassy products. That was clearly the twins' domain. She could literally imagine Remus pulling his own hair faced with that mess whenever he needed to make inventory…

"So, what's going on?" George asked just after closing the door behind him, not acknowledging the mess around him at all. It was like it was part of the landscape…

"What makes you think there's anything going on?" Izzy asked in reply.

"The fact that you're here in the first place," he pointed out. "You don't just leave home on your own and send your parents on a search and rescue mission because everything's okay. So, really, Isabelle, what's going on?"

She sighed, accepting he was just too perceptive to take her excuses. She then took a seat on the only chair in the room that wasn't covered with boxes full of suspicious items and finally spoke. "Have you read the newspaper today?"

He seemed confused for a few seconds before some recognition covered his face as he used his wand to relieve a chair of the boxes on it so he could take a seat a few feet opposite her. "If by 'newspaper' you mean that ministry-propaganda-filled pile of paper that owls bring over every morning_, _then, yes, I may have browsed through it just for the sake of getting my daily dose of hogwash," he said. "So, if this is about the paper, then let me guess: your parents don't want you to go back to a Death Eater-infested Hogwarts."

She raised her eyebrows at him, amazed at how quickly he'd hit the mark. "How did you know?"

"Maybe I have the inner eye," he said, just for the sake of trying to get that heavy look out of her face.

She rolled her eyes. "Be serious, George."

"What? Is it so hard to believe I could give Trelawney a run for her money?" he replied, watching as she had to bite her lower lip to keep herself from letting out a little smile. Stubborn even when it came to smiling, he observed. "Fine. Let's just say I witnessed a similar situation this morning when Fred and I reported to the Burrow for our weekly session of family breakfast," he finally explained.

"Oh," Izzy mumbled. It hadn't occurred to her before that Ginny might be in the same situation as her. "They don't want Ginny to go either?"

George shook his head. "It's mostly Mum. To be fair, this isn't the first time she makes a sweeping declaration about Ginny having no business going back to school although, I have to say, this time around things are much stickier than before… So far, Dad's always been able to change her mind but I'm not sure he'll even try this time – he was pretty quiet through the whole thing."

Izzy nodded. Oddly enough, it made her feel a bit better, knowing she and Ginny were in the same boat, although the fact that such a boat seemed to allow a distance of several miles between them, keeping them from being able to discuss and share those problems was still a bummer. "How did she react?" she asked George.

"She went nuts, obviously. Big shouting match between her and Mum… I'll spare you of the bulky details and just skip to the end when Ginny swore than if they didn't let her go back, she'd make a run for it and maybe even join Harry underground. Now, I really doubt she'd do that since I'm pretty sure she has no idea where he is but still I think it was rash enough to get Mum to give the matter a little more thought before making a final decision," George pointed out.

"Maybe _I _should have pulled that card on my dad too," Izzy mumbled.

"He really was the one… well, leading the charge?"

Izzy nodded. "Pretty ironic, isn't it? My dad, who, from what I've heard, would be reckless enough to poke a dragon with a stick just for the sake of taunting it (never mind he could get charred into a roast), doesn't want me to go back to Hogwarts because Snape's in charge now. Are you kidding me? If he were in my shoes, he'd be the first one there just so he could turn Snape's life into hell!"

He sighed, recognizing that situation hit pretty close to home. Hadn't he, after all, found himself dragging this particular girl out of a potential battlefield, only to make his way back so he could kick some arse over there? He supposed that was the reason why justifying Sirius's actions had felt so easy – because he was, in fact, justifying himself. "This wouldn't be the first time – and I'm sure won't be the last – when standards changed between you being the one putting yourself out there in the dangerous zone or allowing someone you care for a lot to do it," he told her. "Is it fair? Not really. But can you help it? Probably not. Us humans are big fat hypocrites, Isabelle. It's in our nature. It's part of being able to care and it's one of the things that makes us… you know, different. Special. Whatever you choose to name it."

It really, really annoyed her to realize that he was making perfect sense in her head. That he was right. It just sounded so easy coming from him… "So I'm just supposed to accept that I'll be surrounded by hypocrites my whole life?"

"_That_ and also that maybe it won't particularly be a bad thing," he added.

Izzy huffed. "Yeah, _you _would say that. Don't think I've forgotten about your little 'hero act' at the wedding."

George rolled his eyes. "I just _knew _you were going to bring that up," he said. "Can't you get over it. If you're fishing for an apology, you can forget it."

"I'm not fishing for anything," she replied. "I'm just sick of people thinking I can't tell a stunner apart from a tickling charm."

"Nobody thinks that. _I, _for sure, don't. But, Merlin forbid, if Death Eaters showed up out of nowhere right now, I'd still drag you out of here as fast as I could."

She gulped. "Why?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Because you're my friend. Think like this – even great Quidditch Players are bound to have friends and family who worry that they'll get their heads smashed by a bludger. And is that because they think they're bad at what they do? No, it's because bad things can happen even to the best. And you're _fifteen_. Protecting you isn't about thinking you're some fragile flower. It's about wanting to make sure you get to stick around and have an actual life after this is all over."

She didn't speak for a few minutes, reflecting on what he'd told her. He couldn't possibly be fully sure those were the reasons behind her parents', mainly her father's, insistence on her not going back to Hogwarts. Still, in her mind, she could perfectly picture them leaning on that logic – they loved her, so they didn't even want her to get the chance to be in danger. Maybe she'd gone defensive a little too fast… That didn't mean, though, she quickly added in her mind, that she wasn't right too. War changed rules and being protective of a fifteen-year-old girl who knew at the very least the basics about defence should no longer be a priority when there were so many other things to worry about. And then, more important than all, was the fact that, if they did keep her home, her parents were facing the fact that they'd become wanted fugitives, which they seemed to refuse to care about. She might not feel all that furious anymore but that discussion was very far from over. Sighing, she turned to George, who was looking at her with eyebrows raised.

"I know I'm supposed to be prone to comedy and all but are my serious speeches so boring that you have to space out to get through them?" he asked, pretending to be hurt.

She rolled her eyes. "I was doing this thing called thinking… you might have heard of it before."

"Yes, I may have caught some rumours about it," he jokingly replied. "Any big conclusions?"

She shrugged. "They're still mostly under development," she simply replied. "Do you think I'm being stupid? Wanting to go to school infested with Death Eaters when my parents are willing to sacrifice their freedom to keep me home?"

Well, that was a question he really didn't know how to answer. To be honest, if it were up to him to decide between making her stay and letting her go, he was sure he'd stick with the first thanks to the completely bonkers protectiveness of her he'd recently found. Yet, he had enough sense not to say it out loud and to know it wasn't his place to decide or even to change her mind. He'd just be taking a stab at proving himself right in his 'people are natural hypocrites' argument if he did that and likely end up damaging their friendship. "I don't think you're being stupid," he truthfully told her. "But I think it's pretty risky."

"Wouldn't you go if you were me?"

Well, that pretty much did it. "Would you ever take me seriously if I said 'no'?"

She has to chuckle. "Maybe if you'd recently suffered a head injury…"

"Wow, thanks. That's awfully flattering," he replied sarcastically. "I guess, since we're in a complimenting mood, I should keep myself from point out the worrying pattern that I'm seeing here with you storming out after a big fight for the second time in, what, three months? – awfully girlish reaction, Isabelle. I thought you were better than that."

She gave him an appalled look and it took her a few seconds to get that he was also referring to her big Horcrux confrontation with Harry back in July. It annoyed her not only that he hadn't let it go but also that he was accusing her of being overly girlish when handling her fights. Idiot. "Well, I promise that if one day I do end up really angry at you, I won't storm out. I'll just hit you. Maybe even curse you."

"Of course you will. After all, it seems you always end up with me talking you down whenever you pull a stalking-off-in-frustration act."

She pursed her lips together in frustration. "Doing it twice doesn't make a pattern," she replied. "And I only came here this time because everyone else was too far away."

"Excuses, excuses," he said, cockily leaning against the back of his chair. "Would you be very offended if I started charging by the hour?"

Annoyed, she tried to kick him on the shins but he was quick enough to escape her attack, just chuckling in return.

"Fine, we can talk about business later. Now just tell me: how did you get here anyway? Didn't your parents close the floo? Don't tell me you walked. Your place is at the very least forty minutes away walking."

"So what if I did?" she said a bit defyingly.

He raised his eyebrows. "Then you'd have been really stupid. Do you have any idea how easily a teenage girl walking alone on the street could get murdered or kidnapped these days? You may not be openly wanted for now, but if Death Eaters knew they could get their hands on Harry Potter's little sister and make it look like you'd run away on your own, they wouldn't hesitate for a second."

She hadn't really thought of it that way, Izzy realized. It was true she'd gotten how stupid it had been to go out on her own about half-way through her journey there but she hadn't really noted the extent of the pickle she could've put herself into. "Well, to be honest, I actually took the underground, so…"

George made a face of utter disgust at that. "The underground?" he asked in disbelief. "You mean those trains that run around under the ground like… I don't know… moles? That's so weird!"

"Certainly not weirder than Muggles would find travelling between fireplaces," she pointed out. "And clearly you didn't take Muggle studies at Hogwarts or else you'd know the tube was perfectly safe…"

"How could I take that when Care for Magical Creatures and Divination were such a riot?" he asked. "You can't picture me and Fred taking a third optional class, can you? Don't take me wrong – I'm a big fan of Muggle culture – after all, we often use their stuff to inspire our products and all – but that underground thing… it's just plain freaky."

She rolled her eyes and imagined how fun his reaction would be to an actual ride on the so-called tube. It seemed so promising she vowed to find a way to get him there one day. Maybe even take pictures, just for the sake of annoying him. She shook her head, then – that would have to wait for after the war… provided they made it in the first place. "_You'_re all the things in the world you could pick find odd… never mind this is coming from someone who sells stuff like edible dark marks and U-No-Poo for a living!"

"Can't be so freaky if people keep buying them," he replied. "Not to take them themselves, I hope, but still… they're among the fastest to leave the shelves when the shop's full."

Which didn't really seem the case at the moment. "Yeah… about that, I take it the shop's not doing so well these days," she pointed out, forcing a complete change of the subject.

"Oh, don't be fooled by appearances," he stated. "The sales in the actual shop have been a bit down but the owl orders have been through the roof. Especially our line of defence objects. Remus reckons that soon the post office won't have enough owls to deliver everything in time…"

"Well, that's… impressive," she said.

"Impressive? Oh, please, I won't settle for anything short of brilliant," George corrected.

"Bloody modest too," she sarcastically observed just before a knock sounded on the door, to which George replied to by telling whoever it was to come in.

And, just as the door opened up and her mother stepped in, looking slightly irritated as she looked at her, Izzy couldn't say she was upset as she'd expected to be – it actually relieved her to see her there.

"Well, guess it's scold o'clock. I guess I'll leave you to it," George announced, getting up from the chair and starting to head to the door. He's just stepped out a second earlier when his head popped back into the room, a sheepish look on his face. "Oh, and if you do end up exiled at home, Isabelle, I promise I'll visit."

"Thanks," Izzy replied in a dry tone, watching as he closed the door behind him. She bit her lip, then, and glanced at her mother, not really knowing what to expect. "How grounded am I?" she dared asking.

"Still to be determined," Mia said before taking a long breath. "What on Earth were you thinking, Izzy? Going out like that in this time and day? You could have gotten kidnapped! You could have gotten _killed!_"

"I know. I just… I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry, Mum," she said, looking down.

She pursed her lips together, part of her still not done shaking with the fear she'd felt for her daughter. "We looked for you everywhere – we even had to ask your grandparents to help us. Merlin, Izzy. If Remus hadn't sent us s Patronus saying you were here, we might have lost it!"

Izzy didn't reply. She didn't really know what to say – she'd needed to leave and she hadn't cared about the potential consequences at the moment. She was sorry now but only about her reckless exit. Her mind was still set in what came to her wanting to attend Hogwarts the following year.

Sighing, Mia took a few steps towards her daughter and pulled the chair in front of her a bit nearer so that, when she sat down, they were close enough that her knees were bumping against Izzy's. She took the younger girl's hands in her own, making her look up. "I know it doesn't sound fair that we don't want you to go back to Hogwarts," she offered in a soothing tone. "It wouldn't seem that way to me either if I were in your shoes. But you have to understand that it's not easy for us either. The last thing we want is to see you miserable but the thought of sending you over to a place that's not safe anymore, especially when we're practically sure we won't be able to be able to be there for you if you need us… Knowing you have one child out there in danger is bad. Knowing you have two… it's maddening, Izzy."

She could understand their side. She really could. But she just couldn't bring herself to give in. "I get it, Mum. But I just can't stay home. I can't. I'll lose my mind! I know I'll have you around if I have to stay but I already miss my friends like mad. And I just can't stay behind hiding like some wimp! It's not me and it not you either. Home is supposed to be _home_. Not a prison. And that's what you'll be turning it into if you exile us there. Maybe it will happen sooner or later but we owe it to ourselves to at least give not being fugitives a try for a while. And that involves sending me back."

Mia didn't respond for a few seconds. It was true that the possibility of having to hide out for mother… years, maybe, made her want to pull her own hair. But it wasn't that easy. More and more, it was starting to feel like their only chance going underground… She took a deep breath before speaking, deciding to take a more… neutral position. "Honey, I can't say that I want you to go. I doubt there's a single parent around there – at least among those still on our side of this fight – who wants to send their kids over to Hogwarts after these news came out. But we haven't made a final decision yet," she said, causing Izzy to look up at her with a hopeful look on her face. "We're still waiting to see what Professor McGonagall has to say – she's been at Hogwarts all this time and she, more than anyone, will know if sending you over there is a risk worth taking or not. Personally, I wouldn't keep my hopes up but… well…" she stopped speaking when her daughter nodded, hinting she'd gotten the picture.

Choosing not to press the matter as she found the fact that things weren't set in stone yet good enough, Izzy made an effort to shift the conversation a little. "Where's Dad?"

"Outside with Remus," her mother let her know.

She sighed. "Is he really angry? Is that why you had to come ahead?"

Mia shook her head. "He's angry but mostly not at you – you're not the one who came up with these laws, after all. When it comes to you, he's most of all relieved you're okay. But don't think that's going to let you off the hook or anything, though. Somewhere there's a punishment with your name on it, I just haven't had the time to find it yet," she warned Izzy, who nodded back, resigned to that fact. "Your father loves you very much, Izzy – he just wants you to be safe."

Izzy looked down at her hands. "I know," she said before looking up. "But I know what I want too."

Mia huffed. "You're too much alike, you know?" she said, making her daughter raise an eyebrow. "In a day-to-day basis you're a bit less… bold than he is but when one of you thinks you're right about something, well, you'll fight to the nail to get your way done. You're passionate, you're stubborn… you're a little bit too confident in your own abilities at times. I suppose it's a good thing you mostly get along well or else that house would be a warzone every time you clashed."

Her daughter frowned at the comparison while, under less tense circumstances, she might have enjoyed being likened to her father.

Feeling she'd done her part on that matter, Mia gave herself a moment to look around, taking in her odd surroundings. "Did you come all the way here just to talk to George?" she found herself wondering.

Izzy felt her face heating a little. Where had her mother gotten that idea from? Not that it was particularly wrong. "I hadn't really planned it," she said, before realizing how that made her sound like, as an insightful person might put it, 'her subconscious had led her to the object of her affections'. "All my other friends were too far away. And he's not all that bad to talk too… people don't give him much credit beyond his pranking skills…"

Mia smiled. It reminded her of someone she knew, she thought for a moment before shaking her head, feeling silly. "Well, do you want to stay here a little longer or do you think you can handle going out there already?" she asked, starting to get up

Izzy shrugged. "I guess there's no time like the present," she mumbled as she stood up as well.

Before she had a chance to head to the door, her mother touched her arm with her hand in a supportive manned and then, unable to help it, pulled her into a hug.

She didn't even bother protesting, just resting her head against her mother's shoulder. Everything seemed so safe just there and then… She knew the feeling wasn't real but, for a moment, she just let herself be fooled by it.

"Don't run like that again," Mia whispered. "I could barely breathe, wondering if you were okay."

Izzy didn't respond – she just held on to her mum for a little while longer, right up until Mia was the one to take a step back, letting go and opening the door so they could step out.

When they stepped back into the shop, she immediately spotted her father standing by the door with Remus, his arms crossed and posture tense as he discussed something with his friend. Just at the moment when he saw her, thought, she saw something in him change like he was relieved by seeing her. And, as much as she was still annoyed at him and had far from let go of their argument, Izzy had to admit she was happy to see him too…

The conversation with Remus was quickly wrapped up, then, and the werewolf stepped away from her father, likely headed back to his office. Seconds later, as she heard her mother stopping Remus for a moment in order to thank him, Izzy started making her way to her father, a bit tentatively at first.

He didn't move an inch and just waited for her to approach, remaining quiet right up until she was only a couple of yards away. "Had a nice walk?" he finally asked his daughter in a dry tone.

She didn't answer, instead just continuing to walk up to her father with her arms crossed. She could already tell his head was much cooler now than it had been before when they'd fought. "I'm sorry about storming out. But I'm not about the rest. I want to go back," she simply said, laying out all the cards on the table. She supposed it was easier that way – it prevented any misunderstandings.

He eyed her without a word for a few seconds, then glanced at Mia, who gave him a warning look behind Izzy's back, as if she was telling him to take it easy. Maybe he was stubborn, Sirius willed himself to admit. But, being that the case, the girl was a worthy and very exhausting opponent, he admitted, huffing. "We'll talk about this later. Let's just go home now – my head's too stuffed at the moment to jump straight into round 2 on this matter."

A truce, then. She could handle that, just as long as he wasn't expecting her to forget everything. "_Later_, then," she agreed, putting emphasis on the 'later' part.

And, without the need for another word, Sirius was able to read the message between the lines – _I'm not letting this go_, she might as well have said.

Why couldn't she make it easy? He thought. The answer came easily enough – because he sure as hell wouldn't make it easy either, were he in her shoes. _It's just like fighting with yourself,_ Mia has said earlier. Now he got the meaning of those words, he thought in annoyance. He let out a frustrated breath before wrapping his arm around her shoulders, willing himself to simply enjoy the fact that she was alright for the moment. "You're going to be the death of me, you know?"

"I'd rather not," she honestly replied. She'd be perfectly happy with a peaceful resolution. And, as her father started to walk her to the shop's door, Izzy paused for a moment, turning around in order to face George, who stood at the counter, pretending he wasn't paying attention by keeping himself packing some sort of cardboard box by hand probably meant for a mail order. "Hey, George? Thanks," she told him.

He looked up at her and made himself shrug like it wasn't really a big deal. "Don't mention it," he replied.

She offered him a little smile and turned around, walking out with her father as her mother quietly followed behind. George's eyes never left her right up until he saw Sirius taking Izzy along with him when he disapparated right outside the door. And his stare, he was about to realize, didn't seem to go unnoticed.

Someone seemed to clear their throat nearby and, when he turned to face whoever it was, George was frustrated to find Fred leaning against the side of the counter, eyeing him in a way that couldn't just say 'got you'. "What are you looking at?" George asked his twin in annoyance.

Fred grinned cockily. "I spy with my little eye something really, really interesting," he mockingly sing-sang.

George groaned. "Shut up," he mumbled.

"Hum-hum," the other twin patronizingly mumbled. "Ickle Izzy Black? Really?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," he replied, forcing himself to look busy packing the box up by hand when he could be doing so magically.

Fred snorted. "Yeah, you go ahead and stick to that story. Now, excuse me. I've got clients to butter up," he said before walking away, headed towards a couple of people who'd just walked in.

George forced himself to ignore his twin, although he wasn't strong enough to completely let go of the matter. Izzy Black was just a good friend and only cared about her as such, he told himself. The answer that came from part of him was quick. _Tell that to someone who'll believe it, idiot. _Damn. It was like having Fred in his bloody mind!

"Ridiculous," he mumbled to himself. "You're just ridiculous."

And, giving up on convincing himself, he went back to doing some actual work.

**A/N - Well, it's 5 a.m. I'm pretty much dead on my feet. I hope you liked the chapter - writing it was a really great way to relax from the stress of the admission process, so I'm quite fond of it. Feedback is welcome, as always. Review!**

**Anne**


	50. Deliberations

**A/N: Well, another chapter here - big one, as usual. Can't seem to help it... Sorry for the delay again. I've just moved last week, been unpacking ever since and still half my stuff is in boxes... it's a curse. Anyway, I hope you like this chapter. **

"We've got to tell her something," Sirius heard his wife saying as he exited their bedroom's loo fully dressed after that morning's shower.

He found her standing at the window, looking out at the grey day outside with a distant expression on her face. She'd barely slept and he couldn't say he'd done much better himself… something told him that was just the beginning of a series of many sleepless night ahead of them. Sighing, he walked over to Mia, wrapping one arm around her waist and leaning down to kiss the side of her face from behind. "She can wait – we still haven't gotten word from McGonagall. Not that I think it will change much." He was convinced it would take a whole new level of bad news to make him question his decision.

Mia let out an impatient breath before turning around. "Don't say that. We owe it Izzy to at least listen and try to make sure keeping her home is the only acceptable option we have. How would _you_ feel if you were the one being housebound against your will?"

He didn't respond immediately. He'd tried very hard not to put himself in Izzy's shoes since it made him feel like an arse. "Pretty crappy," he eventually admitted. "But that's not the point."

"Isn't it? I feel bad either way – keeping her home or letting her go…" She looked down, crossing her arms. "She was supposed to be the safe one. I knew Harry had to go and face the danger himself but Izzy… she was supposed to be the one we didn't need to worry about. She was supposed to be okay."

She sounded utterly lost and just as much tired, he noted before pulling her closer and holding her firmly in a comforting fashion. Closing her eyes, Mia allowed herself not to think for a few seconds, just taking in his warmth, his smell, the sound of his breath against her ear. It was enough to calm her, even if for just a little while. It was only when a knock sounded on the door that their little moment was interrupted

Sirius to loosened his hold on her and place a small kiss on her cheek before he headed to the door, intending to open it.

He fully expected to find Izzy on the other side, already begging to be let off the hook from the punishment they'd given her – babysitting her younger siblings on her own for a full day.

He supposed they could have come up with a worse punishment, but the fact that he'd admitted, even if just to himself, to having at least partially fuelled his daughter's storming-out stunt led him not to contest Mia's idea for the penance. In any case, he supposed the little ones, as adorable as they might look at first, could prove themselves a nightmare to look after, especially if Alex turned out to be in one of his hyper days which, lately, had been more of a rule than an exception. He really couldn't wait for that whole energy overload that came with the first signs of magic to be over – the kid was proving himself too good an opponent, especially when he decided to run around like a maniac in his surprisingly agile little legs.

However, upon opening the door, he found himself not facing his daughter. Not even close, he added in his mind – it was Kreacher.

"Owls bring mail for Masters," the house elf declared in a deadpan tone.

"Hum, thanks," he mumbled without thinking as he accepted the folded newspaper and the small pile of letters Kreacher handed over. "How's Izzy handling her… task?" he asked casually. The house-elf, despite his mysterious constant disappearing acts of late, seemed to have stuck around that day, likely sceptical of Izzy's ability to handle both her younger siblings at the same time.

Kreacher seemed slightly uncomfortable where he stood, eyeing him with positively confused eyes. One of his eyes was actually twitching. "Young mistress not scared of changing diapers," he simply mumbled, not quite sure of how to react.

"Good for her," Sirius replied. "Keep an eye on them, will you?"

It was only after closing the door that it occurred to him he'd actually been… nice to the house-elf during their short conversation. No insults, no rudeness… a bizarre occasion in their relationship, which, these days, mostly consisted of filling the role for each other's opponents for the sake of habit. _I must be losing my touch, _he thought. No wonder Kreacher had seemed completely weirded out over there.

"Anything from McGonagall?" Mia asked from the bed, on which she'd taken a seat.

He walked over and sat by her side before taking the time to look through the mail. Only two letters aside from the newspaper. Both of them from Hogwarts. "I don't think so," he finally replied.

"What's taking her so long?" Mia asked impatiently.

Sirius shrugged. "Maybe she'd busy," he absently replied as he opened the newspaper, quickly scanning through the first pages' headlines. Only a handful of Muggle-born registry-related news, appointments of news officials to the ministry and a notice of new curfew-times in wizard-run areas – nothing that indicated news concerning Harry, he concluded, folding back the newspaper and turning his attention to the letters. One was addressed to Mia, the other to him.

"Here," he said, handing the first to his wife and starting to rip his own open. "Ten galleons this is my sacking notice," he said dryly.

Mia didn't reply, her eyes on his letter while hers lay forgotten on her lap. She knew better than to take losing bets.

Not wasting time with ceremony, Sirius unfolded the piece of parchment he'd removed from the envelope. "Well, let's see," he mumbled before starting to read out loud. "_Dear Mr. Black…_ a boatload of blah, blah, blah I'll just go ahead and skip ahead of… _Recent changes to the school structures… _blah, blah, blah… ah, here we are," he announced, clearing his throat like he was about to read the most exciting thing in the world. "_Your position was found no longer relevant, therefore your services won't be needed anymore. We'll owl your possessions over at a later time. Yours sincerely, Severus Snape._" He had to roll his eyes at that. "Why, how disgustingly polite of him to write such a pleasant letter when a '_you're fired, now stick it' _type of note would have sufficed." And, honestly, he would've preferred it – damn slimy bastard had to know that disgustingly polite tone would annoy him beyond reason. He shook his head, though, ordering himself not to give Snape the satisfaction of reacting exactly the way he'd intended him to. "Funny thing, though – why is it that they always 'extinguish my position' instead of just plain and straight firing me? Seems a bit unfair on those who actually want to learn how to fly…"

Mia shrugged. "You'd have to ask them. It's just an excuse, really," she mumbled.

"Right," he mumbled, carelessly throwing his letter onto the bed and looking at Mia. "So, what's their excuse for you?"

"Oh," she mumbled in return, realizing she was still holding her unopened letter. "It's probably not very different from yours," she said as she started to rip the envelope open and removing the message, proceeding to red it afterwards. The first couple of paragraphs, which appeared to be a standard introduction likely directed to the Hogwarts staff in general, were, as Sirius had described them 'a boatload of blah, blah, blah'. However, when the letter became specifically directed to her, she found herself caught by surprise. "He's got to be kidding me," she said under her breath.

"What is it?" Sirius said, getting up from his seat.

"I… I'm not fired," she said in disbelief. "Not yet, at least, as long as I comply to accepting the regular teacher living arrangements in the school and completely change the syllabus for my class. Can you believe this? Apparently, I have to put more emphasis on moments in history when Muggles, I quote, '_showed their true wicked nature by acting hostile and even murderously towards witchcraft in any of its forms'_. Are they kidding me? They want me to help them spreading _their_ dirt? Snape's knows me better than this. Why would he want me around, anyway? He knows perfectly well I'm in the Order. He knows where my allegiances lie."

"He's taunting us," her husband easily guessed. _Taunting me,_ he added in his mind. "I'm not sure why… I'm not even sure how he thinks this would ever work as taunting material because there's no way you'd ever take this deal but it's the only explanation – he's mocking the hell out of us."

Mia didn't respond. Suddenly, the tone of that letter made her think of something else – was that how it was going to be like from then one? Were they going to change every subject at Hogwarts to mirror their side's beliefs? And, if they did, was that part of some twisted plan to turn their children against them? Twist their minds into hating everything muggle-related or even slightly against the new system? The thought alone was sickening and more doable than she'd ever want to admit…

"What the hell is that?" her husband suddenly asked in a surprised tone, taking the letter she'd absently folded back from her hands and showing her the back. There was something written there – something she had a feeling didn't actually belong there.

"The handwriting is different," she observed. Almost mechanical, like it had been written by one of those automatic note-taking quills, she noted before starting to read.

_Received your patronus yesterday. The Hogwarts situation concerns me as well but it's far too complicated for us to discuss without it being in person._

_Please meet me today at 4.30 in the afternoon at the address below. Specifically say you came to meet me and they will take you to me._

The post-scriptum note proceeded to list an address somewhere in Edinburgh, not adding any more directions than those. There wasn't a signature but it wasn't needed, in any case. She already knew the message was from McGonagall.

How, she wondered, had a message from their old transfiguration teacher gotten on the back of a letter from Severus Snape? How has she missed it just minutes before when she'd been holding the letter?

"Look, it's on the back of mine too," Sirius said, showing her the letter he'd previously discarded, which appeared to contain an identical look on the back. Word by word.

"This is odd," Mia mumbled. It just seemed strange picturing McGonagall writing two exactly identical messages for them and somehow attaching them to Snape's. Passing one along seemed hard enough, so why try for two when they were bond to read both?

"Odd indeed… pretty curious way to pass a message along," Sirius observed, his eyebrows raised. "I'll give her credit for the creativity, though."

Mia nodded in agreement. "She must've somehow known only we could read this," she quickly concluded. "I mean," she added, turning the piece of parchment around, "she somehow managed to smuggle two messages into Snape's letters. Clearly this isn't something she managed out of the spur of the moment."

"Smart lady, that McGonagall," Sirius mumbled before letting out a long breath. "So I guess that settles it. We'll hear what she has to say. Then we'll tell our decision to Izzy, whatever it turns out to be – she'll be busy handling the kids in the meanwhile, I hope."

Mia sighed and rested her head on Sirius's shoulder. "Is it silly to hope McGonagall has good news? Even though we know the odds of that are very slim?"

His hands gently stroke her loose hair. "It's never silly to hope for the best. The problem is that it gets us hurt sometimes."

"Yes," she said, a sense of reassignment in her voice. "It does." She stood up, Sirius quickly following her up. "Well, I'm going to take a shower… see if it clears my head a little. Maybe you should go downstairs in the meanwhile. Check on Izzy's doing with Alex and Mary," she suggested.

He nodded. "Yes. I suppose seeing her crumbling under the pressure of babysitting two kids under the age of three might cheer me up in a slightly sadistic sort of way," he declared, making Mia give him a look. "What? She mocks me too when I'm the one in a pickle with them."

She shook her head. "Keep in mind you're not supposed to rejoice at your children's misery," she reminded him as she retreated to the loo.

"Hum, hum," he mumbled dismissively, already making his way out of the room and down the stairs, expecting to find some sort of panic-riddled situation when he came into the living room.

Bizarre images ranging from Izzy pulling her own hair in despair to young Alex jumping on the sofa while pointing some sort of pitchfork-like instrument at his older sister's neck crossed his mind. Of course, he was perfectly aware that the ever-watchful Kreacher would never let the situation escalade to that level, but the image itself did provide Sirius with some comical relief. He sure needed some of it.

Yet, upon actually stepping into the living room, Sirius did find himself faced with a bizarre image. Just not the kind he expected. His first born, the one he'd fully expected to find begging to be spared of her penance, appeared to be calmly lounging on the sofa, reading the latest edition of the Quibbler as her deceivingly angelic younger brother busied himself by doodling all over a large piece of parchment on the coffee table and little Mary sat on a blanket on a floor, mercilessly torturing a poor stuffed animal Sirius couldn't really identify by waving it around by an ear.

He looked at Kreacher, who sat on a corner polishing a chandelier, just to make sure he wasn't intervening in any way to create that scene. The considerable pile of polished items by his side seemed to indicate he'd been overly busy to spare Izzy a hand at all.

_Whose kids are those?_ he had to wonder for a moment. Annoyed, he cleared his throat, earning little more than a look from his first-born, who seemed to be set on giving him a cold shoulder until she got an answer concerning her schooling situation for the next few months. "Wasn't this…" he asked, gesturing to the general area his children were occupying "… supposed to be some sort of punishment?"

"For all intents and purposes, it is," Izzy replied, closing the magazine in front of her and laying it on her lap. "It's not my fault that Alex decided not to act like little barbarian you expected him to be today." Although, she had to admit, bribery might have something to do with that fact.

Sirius gave her a suspicious glare, later shifting it to his son, who looked so focused in his drawing (little more than a bunch of lines and curves thrown together) one might think he was drafting the portrait to the next Hogwarts headmaster. "Little scamp, aren't you?" he mumbled under his breath, shaking his head in disapproval at the oblivious little boy. Just when one wanted him to be the little devil he regularly channelled, the kid had to act like the most obedient of children. "And _you_," he mumbled again, eyeing the infant on the floor with narrowed eyes, receiving from the little girl only an adorably indignant look followed by a big smile. "Couldn't even throw a little tantrum for Daddy? I see, so this is the face of betrayal coming from your own flesh and blood," he dramatically declared.

As much as she was still angry at her father for his position in her schooling debacle, she couldn't keep her lips from stubbornly curling, faced with his overplayed annoyance. "Maybe the universe just knows I'm right, therefore this punishment was never meant to be," she suggested.

The look on his face changed and she could see said annoyance was no longer being overplayed. "We both know this isn't about being right or wrong in this Hogwarts matter, Izzy. It's about your little London adventure yesterday that stripped me from at least ten years of life."

She looked down, frustrated. He had a point there and it only annoyed her that she'd brought it upon herself. "I've already said I was sorry about that," she apologetically told him.

He sighed. "I get that you needed to bolt even if it was monumentally stupid but if what you really wanted was to vent to Ginny, you could have said so. Your Mum and I would try and figure something out. You didn't need to go running to the twins to try and get them to take you to her."

She raised her eyebrows. So _that_ was what her father thought she'd been intending to do by going to the shop? she questioned herself where he'd gotten that idea from before concluding he really had no reason to figure that her going to the shop was more about a certain _other_ Weasley than about Ginny… Of one thing she was sure – she wasn't going to be the one to go ahead and correct his assumption. "Yeah, well, you might keep in mind that you were not very high in my list of go-to people yesterday afternoon," she replied in a dry manner. "You were very low, actually. Lower ten low."

He frowned. "Nice to hear. So… where exactly am I on that list at the moment?"

She shrugged. "Slightly above the Malfoys… fairly below Kreacher," she said, adding the last part just for the sake of annoying him.

Sirius gave her an appalled look and then turned to the house-elf in question, who showed some sort of smug look before disappearing with a 'pop', dragging the pile of newly-polished items with him. "That's an awful thing to say."

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "Is it?" she asked just as little Alex, done with his drawing, approached to hand it to her.

"Done!" the little boy said, quite proud of himself.

Izzy smiled at her little brother, ruffling his dark hair before accepting the doodle-covered piece of parchment. "Nice job. This one's for Grandma Lulu, right?"

Alex nodded, full of certainty.

"Alright, go on," she said, putting the drawing down on a little table at her back and fetching more parchment to hand to the little boy. "Do one for Auntie Elizabeth now, okay?"

"'Kay," the little boy agreed. "Then cookies?"

She didn't miss the odd look her father gave her, like he was saying something along the lines of '_caught you red-handed_', before ruffling her brother's hair again. "After you've drawn for everyone." 'Everyone', she added in her mind, being every single person she could possibly think of to keep the keep the kid occupied with his drawing, ranging from their parents to Filch, if necessary.

Alex seemed satisfied enough with that promise and made his way back to the coffee table, by which he kneeled, immediately picking up a handful of crayons to start his new draw.

"Bribery, hum?"

"You never said it wasn't allowed," Izzy replied, shrugging and opening the magazine again, just for the sake of sending the message that, if her father didn't have anything Hogwarts-related to tell her, she wasn't interested in more small talk.

Sirius groaned internally at that. Stubborn as a mule – for a moment, he had to wonder what it would be like to have a perfectly obedient daughter who simple smiled and nodded when he told her to stay put at home, safe and away from Death Eaters. He found himself wrinkling his nose at that. Something just wasn't right about that image. He couldn't really tell what since, in theory, a kid like that would be a whole lot easier to handle. He shook his head and told himself to forget it – there were worse fates than ending up with pig-headed kids, especially when one was pig-headed himself.

He sighed and glanced down at little Mary, who looked up at him from the floor in amazement, like he was the tallest person she'd ever laid eyes on, squealing just before he picked her up and settled her on his lap when he sat down on the arm of the sofa at Izzy's feet. At least that one, as well as her now artistic brother, he'd get to keep under his wing for a little longer. Teenage and independence was still a long way down the road for those two. Part of him wished that was also the case for their sister… as if it wasn't bad enough his godson was out there, being hunted down like an animal.

His eyes shifted to Izzy and remained firmly on her. Although he could tell she knew she was being observed, no acknowledgement was offered beyond her flipping a page of the magazine. He hated that part of their disagreement more than anything – the distance – and yet he couldn't fully blame her for enforcing it. Sighing, he decided to thrown her a figurative bone."

"So, we just got a message from McGonagall," he ended up saying.

That seemed to catch Izzy's attention as she immediately dropped the magazine and looked at her father expectantly. "And…" she said, urging him to continue, hoping, just hoping the final decision had been made and that it didn't involve barring her from going back to school.

"And she's asking your Mum and I to meet her this afternoon," he informed her, using one of his legs to rock a squirming Mary on his lap.

"And then you'll make your final decision, won't you?"

Sirius nodded before biting his lower lip, wondering if he should say what he wanted to say. Ultimately, it needed to be said, he thought, so he just went ahead and let it out. "I'll be completely honest here, Izzy. I can't think of a reason why anything McGonagall has to say will convince me that sending you to Hogwarts next year completely unprotected could be a good idea."

"It's not about being a good or a bad idea, Dad," she said. "It's about being the right one."

"I'm not convinced that's the case either, Izzybel," he admitted, putting Mary back on her blanket as she seemed to be getting far too cranky on his lap by then.

She huffed. "You would if you were the one being told you just had to be happy with having to stand back from the fight and wait for someone else to do all the work while the people you love the most pay the price by becoming outlaws. If you were the one in my shoes, we wouldn't even be having this conversation – you'd be packing your bag and making a run for Hogwarts instead."

He really, really hated that she might just be right. That sounded just like classic teenage Sirius. It didn't, however, sound like classic teenage Izzy. "I probably would. But _you_ wouldn't."

She narrowed her eyes, annoyed at the certainty with which her father had said so. "What makes you so sure of that?" she asked, more for the sake of bluffing than anything else.

"The fact that you're twice the kid I was," he easily told her. "Plus, also the fact that you have someone who'd even ask you not to throw yourself into this fight while I didn't."

That statement alone stunned her, making her frown after a few seconds. "That's not true. What about Mum? What about Harry's grandparents? They were as good as your parents after you ran away from home."

Sirius huffed. "Well, your Mum wouldn't have asked me to stay for the simple fact that she'd have… no, she _was_ right there fighting by my side for as long as she could. As for the Potters… they were different, Izzy."

She gave him an accusing look. "You mean they were enlightened enough to get that fighting or not fighting should be their kids' choice and not theirs?" she asked in a slightly accusatory manner.

"No, I mean they were aurors," her father corrected her, keeping his voice just low enough so he wouldn't startle Mary and Alex, even though he sure did feel frustrated enough to yell. "They were big-time aurors, Izzy – Judy Potter was probably one of the first female ones in the department. And they knew for a very long time that James wanted to follow their footsteps, so, from about the time he was… I don't know… eight or nine they started preparing themselves for the possibility that eventually they'd have to let their kid risk his life on a daily basis. So, when our time came, I won't say it was easy for them to let us go but they were ready. And it sure helped that we were of age by then."

Even though the first part of that speech actually made sense in her mind, the last one just annoyed her. "Fine," she found herself mumbling. "So maybe I'd think twice before making a run for Hogwarts. But tell me this – if it's all about me being underage, can you promise that in a year and a half when I turn seventeen you'll just snap out of this and let me go take my part in the fight?" _That_, she thought, was the big question that needed to be answered. And, as her father hesitated one second… then two… then three, she was sure the answer was exactly the one she'd expected and exactly the one she'd hoped not to get. "Well, there we have it, don't we, Daddy? You're just using age as an excuse."

Sirius huffed, annoyed more at himself than at Izzy. "It's not that easy. So, right now you're fifteen…"

"_And _a half," she firmly added.

"Sure, fifteen and a half," he said, accepting the correction. "But tell me, Izzybel – of those fifteen and a half years, how many have you been in my life?"

She pursed her lips together. "Three," she mumbled. Saying it felt so odd… it seemed like so much longer in her head.

"Three years," he repeated. "Leaving twelve we lost in between. When you put it into perspective, three years is too little, Izzy. And, yes, you're only one year and a half – even less than that – from turning of age and, by then, odds are I won't have a choice between letting you go or not. But although it may seem like a small leap from here to there, when you compare it to those three years we had as a family, it's a lot. Our time's been cut short – can't you understand why I don't want to cut it even shorter if I have a choice? Why I don't want you to grow too fast by sending back to Hogwarts to fend for yourself against Snape and the Carrows?"

"I won't be by myself," Izzy said. "I'll have my friends. The D.A. We'll all be in the same boat – like you and _your _friends were. And I _do _understand what you're trying to say – three years together is too little and one year and a half is too much when you want to skip it. But there will be years after that. Hopefully happy years, not… whatever _this _is. I won't have a foot out the door when I turn seventeen unless _you _make me."

Sirius tensed. "That's not fair."

"Neither is making me the reason why you and Mum will be making the top of the wanted list by not sending me back. It's not like they'll be turning Hogwarts into a slaughter house – it wouldn't make sense. They need followers and we're… well, I guess you could call us 'the future of the Wizarding World'. They need to brainwash us so we'll be on their side."

Her father gave her an incredulous look. "You actually think that's a soothing perspective?"

"No. But that's where you'll need to trust us not to be brainwashed. Believe it or not, I'm old enough to tell what's right apart from what's wrong."

With a long huff, Sirius sunk from the arm of the sofa to the seat at her feet. She was exhausting to argue with – always an answer prepared, always willing to annoy him. She would, as he'd said the previous day, be the death of him.

Oblivious to the tension in the room, little Alex delivered another draw to his older sister, who rewarded him with a smile and ordered yet another one, that time for him. Sirius took it as a sign that the truce between them was, at least partially, back on. He thanked Merlin for that as his head couldn't take more of it, especially when he was pretty sure nothing he said would make Izzy give up on her side of the argument and nothing she said would make him give up on his.

"So, what now? We just agree to disagree?" Izzy asked after a few seconds, like she shared his thought exactly.

He huffed. "I don't think that's going to work out. Eventually you'll either go or not go to Hogwarts and, no matter the decision," _probably the latter, _he added in his mind, "one of us won't be happy about it."

He had a point, she thought. And she hated that he did. Again. Why couldn't all arguments end with them agreeing? Why couldn't it just be simple? She didn't want to fight anymore. "Promise me something, Daddy," she finally requested.

"What?" he asked, curious about what she was going to ask.

"Promise you'll give McGonagall a chance to change your mind today," she said.

"What makes you think she will even try?" he replied.

Izzy shrugged. "Maybe she won't. But if she has something good to say, don't just shut it out. It's not fair if you do. I want to know I still have a chance."

He supposed it wasn't too much to ask from her part, although he could tell she was, even if just a little, trying guilt him into changing his mind. She definitely had that 'please, Daddy' look on her face. "She'd somehow find a way to punish me if I didn't listen at all, anyway," he said. "But in return, you have to promise me something."

"Name it."

"Either you stay or, for some completely messed up, very unlikely if not impossible reason, I do end up caving, promise you won't do something incredibly stupid. Something that, when you think of it, some part of you says 'yeah, Dad would _definitely_ do this'."

She smiled just for the fact that he'd acknowledged the slim possibility of letting her go back. "Are you calling yourself stupid?"

"No. I'm calling myself wild, which is something I don't want you to be. So, promise me."

She huffed. That was a tricky one. "I promise I won't be wild just for the sake of being wild. But if circumstance requires me to…"

"That's not helping your case, Isabelle," he pointed out.

"I know. But I'd rather be honest," she stated.

He groaned. Of course she wasn't going to make it easy for him. She was _his _kid, after all. What could he expect? Stretching one arm towards her in an inviting fashion, he sighed. "Well, come here, then," he said.

Her lips curled a little and she shifted closer to her father, eventually resting her head on his shoulder and letting him wrap a protective arm around her. For a moment, it made her feel everything was back to normal… then it was all gone and she was aware that they were still in an impasse. It was moments like those that made her feel worse about it. "I hope you know that I'm not doing any of this to hurt you," she heard herself saying.

He nodded. "I know," he mumbled, kissing the top of her head. "Me neither."

"Are you sure this is it?" Sirius asked, staring at the large building in front of them.

"It's the right address," Mia replied, re-checking the note McGonagall had sent. "Unless Edinburgh has two streets with exactly the same name in the same neighbourhood, this is it."

"Right," he mumbled. It was a Hotel. One of those very fancy hotels with doormen and walls sprinkled with gold where you'd expect to find Muggles with formal clothing and very elaborate hats waiting for tea. "I don't think we're dressed for this place."

Mia turned to her husband, giving him a strange look. "I think that's the least of our worries these days," she pointed out, even though she recognized that their very basic Muggle clothes would feel out of place in the hotel McGonagall summoned them to.

Their reception into the building was, as expected, awkward with a snotty-looking receptionist trying but not succeeding to be polite as she tried to banish them – in her eyes hopeless tourists beneath the establishment – away from the lobby with a simple look. When they announced they were there to meet Minerva McGonagall, though, the woman looked so embarrassed one might swear she'd just insulted the queen herself, which led Sirius and Mia to wonder if their former teacher was a regular of some sort. Truth to be told, although they'd known McGonagall for years, they simply hadn't the palest idea what she did outside of school limits.

They were led by the very apologetic receptionist into a classy-looking dining room where there even seemed to be a harpist playing in a corner. As they walked across the room, Sirius and Mia looked at each other with eyebrows rising – that was definitely _not_ what they'd been expecting for that afternoon.

A few seconds later, they spotted their Transfigurations master sitting at a secluded corner table, fully clad in fancy Muggle clothes but somehow looking very McGonagall-like at the same time – Sirius almost expected her to send him a stern look for something bad he did or even thought of doing and haul him to the nearest detention session.

By the time they were only a couple of yards away from the table, the receptionist turned on her heel without a word, as if something all of a sudden pulled her away from that general area. And, as they walked closer and closer, the sounds around them started to fade, like all the people around, as well as the harp's music, had suddenly gone mute. Sirius knew a good imperturbable spell when he stepped into one

"Well," he started just as they sat at the table, "I've got to say this isn't really the meeting place I expected. Somehow my mind pictured something along the lines of an abandoned building or some underground facility."

His former teacher raised an eyebrow at him. "Why, perhaps a World War II bunker next time, then?"

Mia cleared her throat and shot her husband a look that clearly told him to shut up. "Don't listen to him, Minerva. This is a very pleasant place," she said.

"Thank you. It belongs to a second cousin of mine from a Muggle branch of the family. Death Eaters often disregard family ties with Muggles, branding them as simple nuisances – I suppose that's an advantage to our side," the woman casually said as she took another sip from her cup, surprising both Sirius and Mia. They didn't even know McGonagall had a Muggle branch of her family in the first place – it was just odd how little they knew of a person they'd grown so attached to. "Well, anyway, I don't suppose we've come here to discuss our surroundings, have we?" the older woman said, always straight to the point.

"No, we haven't," Mia agreed. "So you've received our message."

McGonagall nodded. "Yes. You were lucky your patronus caught me outside of Hogwarts – I'm afraid these days they tend to… disintegrate upon crossing the school wards. A cautionary measure from our new management, you could say," she told them dryly.

"So that's why you couldn't answer in the same way?" Sirius asked. "Because those sure were some interesting notes you sent us."

"Well, I suppose I could have used a patronus, provided I cast it out of school limits – fortunately we're still allowed to leave whenever we want to, at least before the school year starts and harsher rules apply. But I was somewhat curious to test this little plan I'd come up with in my mind… for when our liberties become more limited. Current times require a certain amount of creativity from our part, I'm afraid."

"But how did _that _work?" Sirius asked. "Because I'm pretty sure Snape wouldn't have just handed you his letter and let you scribble on the back for the sake of saving parchment."

McGonagall sighed. "That would be far too much to ask from him these days wouldn't it? Obviously he wasn't aware he was sending my note along with his when he owled you – fortunately enough, Severus still does not inspect his own mail and he takes enough precautions to make sure his… peers do not intercept it either. That way, you could say that – how should I put this? – 'piggybacking' my messages on his own seemed like the safest way to get them out of the castle discretely, which might come handy eventually. I knew he'd be owling every member of the Hogwarts staff last night, so shortly after getting your patronus, I had a house-elf stealing all his stationary. That way, I could write my message to you on it and make it invisible until the person I intended it for touched the parchment. Then I just had it put back right where it was before and waited for him to send it out," the older woman explained.

"How did you know those exact pieces of parchment you wrote on would reach _us_ in particular?" Mia asked, curious.

"I didn't," she confessed. "I copied the message to every single piece of parchment he owned. I suppose if you ever receive another letter from Severus on the same batch of stationary, you may find my message on the back again. I'm still perfecting the spell to make it will fade after being read – it's still a work in progress."

"It's bloody brilliant so far," Sirius observed, making the older woman's lips curl just a little, proudly. "I wouldn't mind learning it myself."

McGonagall gave him a slightly stern look. "Well, if you have a few years to spare in order to master scholar-level transfiguration, you actually might, Sirius. I always thought that if you put as much effort in studying as you did in horsing around with your friends, you might have turned into some sort of world-class scholar, Sirius."

He just looked at the woman silently for a few seconds. She couldn't be serious, could she? "On second thought, I'll leave the art of sneaky-messaging to you," he mumbled, quickly accepting that simply wasn't for him.

His former teacher shook her head in disapproval, mumbling something about some sort of waste. "Regardless," she said a few seconds later, "I imagine you have some questions to ask. I take that, seeing as you got my message, you already know what future you'll have at Hogwarts. Or lack of it," she added, looking pointedly at Sirius, indicating she already he'd been unceremoniously sacked.

"How bad is it over there?" Mia questioned.

McGonagall made a sour face. "It's not good. Just the fact that Dementors were now placed in charge of guarding the school makes it all more depressing. But, all in all, it could be worse."

"How?" Sirius asked. "Dementors are bad enough on their own but add that to the fact that the Carrows are living under the same roof as you and that Snape stole your job as headmistress and it sounds enough like hell to me."

The transfiguration master sighed, just managing to hide her resentment at having been unable to keep the job Dumbledore had entrusted her with. "Severus did steal my position as headmistress but at least he let me keep my job," she replied. "He let everyone stay, you being the glaring exception – I suppose your feud was just too much to swallow. And, also, there's Charity Burbage's situation, with her being missing for a few months. But the point is, he's taking a very firm position at the school."

"And how is that 'not bad'?" he inquired in disbelief.

McGonagall huffed in frustration. "Sirius, I can assure you I have absolutely no sympathy for Severus Snape after he did what he did to Albus. None whatsoever. But this position he's taking…" She hesitated, trying to figure out how to express her point. "The Carrows have no respect for him at all – I imagine he only keeps them around because his master demands it. But it seems he's set on showing them who's the headmaster of that school."

"How?"

"Well, let's just if it were up to the Carrows, every single member of the staff would have been sacked and replaced with someone from their side. Snape wouldn't have it, though – he insisted that that would be a step too far. It would give parents a better reason to risk not sending their children to a school full of enemies, regardless of the consequences."

"Guess he's not completely stupid, after all," Sirius mumbled. "But surely you don't think that means he's even somewhat on our side."

"Of course not. But he's smart and calculating," McGonagall said. "The Carrows are bold and too set on getting their fun, which isn't exactly the same concept as ours. Snape doesn't like it. He's set on showing them they won't have their way, so he only lets them get away with a small number of things and even then with several restrictions. He's making a stand for his own position by being contrary to them, which, so far, is good for us."

"And his lovely master just lets him get away with it?"

"I'd say he's quite trusted by his master – it appears murdering Dumbledore has given him quite an amount of leeway. And, if you want my opinion, he-who-must-not-be-named does somehow appreciate Snape putting the Carrows on a leash – they're sure to be loyal to him, yes, but their instability must make them very high-maintenance…" she observed thoughtfully. "In any case, Severus is busy with his power play for now but, as I said, he's calculating. A true Slytherin, if I ever met one. So, while in a short term this behaviour of his may be favourable to us, in a long term…" She sighed, stopping herself. "Let's just say that if you throw a frog into boiling water, it'll jump out as far as it can, but if you put it in a cauldron full of cold water and slowly let it simmer, it will boil before it knows it."

"Meaning he's trying to fool us and the parents into a false sense of security," Mia guessed.

McGonagall nodded. "Almost surely."

"Well, he won't be fooling _us_," Sirius concluded.

His former teacher took a sip of her tea. "You don't want to send your daughter back," she guessed easily, judging by his tone. "What does Isabelle have to say about that?"

"Nothing positive," Mia declared. "Izzy wants to go back very badly. She wants to fight her own battles and she doesn't want us to risk going to Azkaban on her account…"

"We can't expect much less from a Gryffindor, can we?" the other woman said, her lips curling just slightly with a hint of sad pride for her own house. "But I'm afraid her concerns are more serious than you're judging them. Especially if you consider the two of you won't be the only ones facing Azkaban if Isabelle doesn't show up at school on 1 September."

Sirius frowned deeply. He had a feeling more bad news were on the way. "What do you mean?"

McGonagall sighed. "You must be wondering how I gathered all this information," she said, confusing them for a moment by partially shifting the conversation. "Let me just say that house-elves can be very handy. Especially free ones. Very handy indeed, especially when you want to… overhear things. Unfortunately, those aren't always good things. It seems rumours of quite a number of parents intending to disobey the law and to keep their children away from Snape and the Carrows at Hogwarts, no matter the price, have reached You-Know-Who's ears." She imagined it hadn't occurred to him before just how much one would be willing sacrifice for love… "And, unfortunately, he found it fitting to offer people yet another incentive not to keep their children from Hogwarts. Not a positive one."

Mia looked at her former teacher in anticipation. "What is it?"

"Azkaban. Not just for the parents – for the children too."

Sirius stared at the woman in disbelief. "No," he mumbled. "No way. That's insane. That's…"

"…inhumane," Mia finished for him. "They're _children_. They're innocent. Most of them wouldn't have a say."

"It's not about the cause, Mia, it's about the consequences," McGonagall declared. "Parents will be left with no choice. If they were willing to give everything up for their children, they'll know that between sending them to school and sending them to Azkaban, the first will be the lesser evil. Would you risk making your daughter a fugitive?"

Sirius looked pale as a ghost. The thought of Izzy in Azkaban was imply vile. "We'll end up that way sooner or later. We're Harry Potter's family – that makes us targets."

"Maybe. Maybe they won't come after you for years. Maybe they'll spare the children and only use you two as bait for the sake of turning them into the next generation of their regime," McGonagall offered. "There are a lot of maybes attached to each decision. But I don't think I need to tell you what the real question here is."

No, he thought, she didn't. Because he was already asking it to himself. Could he live with knowing his daughter would become a fugitive over something he was making her do? While knowing that, were she ever caught, she'd be taken to the very same place that still sometimes haunted his nightmares?

Maybe it was only a matter of semantics – as he'd said, they might all become fugitives sooner or later. Azkaban might very easily slip back into the family's prospects… so, why did it just make him sick to think of even playing any sort of role on his daughter's potential downfall? While, at the same time, sending her back was a possibility he didn't even want to consider? Keeping her home was supposed to help her… "This is a nightmare," he said, rubbing his face on his hands.

Mia, looking equally devastated, was the next to speak. "Are you sure you got it right? That the children could really…?"

"You'll know by the time you get home," McGonagall declared. "Dobby said they were planning to announce it on the Evening Prophet today."

"Merlin…" Mia mumbled.

"This is _not_ fair!" Sirius said quite loudly, yet completely unnoticed by the other tea-drinkers in the room. "They have no business bringing children into this! First Harry, now Izzy! It's not fair to them."

McGonagall gently placed a hand over this. It was in moments like those that she was glad she had never had children as much as she had wished in the past to be a mother. Being put in such a position, choosing between two evils for her child, was simply imaginable. "Nothing is fair in a war, Sirius. It isn't now and it wasn't last time around when you were children yourselves. I won't tell you how to raise your daughter, but, faced with this facts, I'd say she has a say in this. She'll be made responsible for the decision, therefore she has a right to choose."

She was right. For the first time since he'd heard the news about Death Eaters running Hogwarts, leaving it up to Izzy actually made sense in his mind, Sirius realized.

"We already know what she'll decide," Mia said.

"Then start planning how to deal with it. In any case, you need to know that Isabelle will be looked after. Albus left me in charge of that school and it will take much more than a few ministry decrees for me to simply hand that school for You-Know-Who and his servants to do as they please with _my _students. I can't promise to stop every little thing they do but I can assure you that I'll do everything in my power so no student of mine is hurt beyond repair. And if or when Hogwarts stops being a better alternative to Azkaban, I'll tear that place apart looking for a way to get those children out. We all will."

It was a powerful promise. The kind that would make people stand up and go along without a question. But, somehow, at the moment, it didn't seem like enough. Not nearly. He trusted McGonagall with his life. He should trust her with Izzy's too – in theory, he did. But there was still something… missing. He couldn't quite point a finger at what it was.

"Funny," Mia mumbled, "how unthinkable compromises start to sound appealing when faced with something like this."

Sirius turned to her, wondering what she meant. It took a single look between the two of them for him to get it. "He fired me. But not you."

Mia shook her head. "Not me."

The idea seemed appalling, to say the least. Sending not only his child but also his wife into a school run by Death Eaters. The danger, the separation… it was simply a nightmarish prospect. So, why couldn't he bring himself to protest it? He knew why. Because the one person he trusted as much as himself was Mia. He'd never trust anyone more than her to keep their child safe. That, he thought, was what was missing, as cruel as it might be in the end.

"Mia, are you sure?" McGonagall said, realizing their plan. "They won't let you keep your living arrangements. You'll be lucky if they let you come home one… maybe two weekends a month. You have very young children at home."

Mia didn't respond. Thinking of not seeing Alex or Mary for weeks made her feel hallow… at least partially – she'd only been apart from them for two, three days at the most.

"Izzy will hate it if you do this because of her," Sirius commented, his tone quiet, not letting out any emotion, like part of him had shut down.

"She'll live with it," Mia mumbled in return. Her eyes burned but she refused to cry. She didn't want to go. She didn't want Izzy to go. She didn't want Harry to be out there Merlin knew where. She wanted to close her eyes and be in another world, one without all that mess on it.

Was that so much to ask for? To ask for a world that wasn't set against them? Because any way they looked at it, it was always the same. And after all they'd gone through, both had the feeling that the year ahead of them was set to be the most stressful one of their lives. Merlin helped them.

**A/N2: Once again, I hope you liked the chapter. A bit heavy, especially in the end. Feedback is welcome. Review!**


	51. Those Who Go

**A/N: Well, I sort of had planned to post this chapter earlier... but then again, when I planned that, this was supposed to be a 4k-word chapter at the most with a nice little out-take to complement it. Now, here we are with a 9k-word chapter and an out-take being devoloped on the side... these things just seem to get a life of their own. Well, anyway, I hope you like the chapter - it sure is one of my favourites so far...**

**1 September 1997**

"… and, above all, _never_ let your guard down around them. I mean it. _Never._ The Carrows are some of the nastiest people you'll ever run into in your whole life."

Mia sighed upon hearing the same sermon for the umpteenth time since having decided to accompany Izzy back to Hogwarts. Admittedly, she was starting to get how her daughter had felt like upon hearing her own share of sermons. "I know that, Gabe," she murmured tiredly, not bothering to face him as she was too busy finishing checking if she had everything she needed to take along with her to Hogwarts in her trunk.

"And don't _ever_ leave your wand behind. Not even if you're just going somewhere around the corner – that's a basic mistake. You need to see that school as enemy territory," he continued in the same concerned tone.

She could hear the floor creaking under his feet as he paced. It was, to put it simple, a very annoying sound, especially to a pair of sleep-deprived ears such as her own. Ears that had already had enough that day (which was, unbelievably, not even ten hours old yet) thanks to little Mary having thrown the mother of all fits the previous night over a bad case of teething. Truth to be said, it wasn't like she or Sirius had been bound to get much sleep, anyway, given how jumpy they'd been feeling already, but dealing with a baby crying until after dawn had given a whole other notion of misery to that night.

"Merlin, Gabriel, do you think I raised that girl to be a moron? And stop pacing, will you? You're making me dizzy," she suddenly – and thankfully, as it successfully stopped Gabriel's pacing – heard her mother saying from where she stood. "Look, Mia is not even what you'd generally call a 'girl' anymore. She's a woman with children of her own, who's been in and out of battles in the past without much trouble."

"That's not what I recall when I think back to that battle at the ministry last ye…"

"Oh, for Merlin's sake, she's fine now, isn't she?" Lulu pointed out just as Mia turned around to face her parents. While Gabriel could easily pass for the poster-guy of all worry, her mother simply stood against the doorway of her bedroom rolling her eyes at him every once in a while. One might think she was discussing something remarkably trivial. "If we just cling to what might or might not have happened wrong over every risky thing we did in the past, we may as well kiss our sanity goodbye. Mia knows how to take care of herself. What's left for us to do is to trust her not to put her brains to waste."

"Which I don't plan to do," Mia agreed, for once feeling thankful for her mother's far-from-overbearing parenting techniques.

Gabriel huffed and paced some more, that time not saying anything in return. Of course he _knew_ Mia was an adult and that she could take care of herself. But she was his only child and he'd already lost her once… at least in his head. He didn't want to go through that again. "I don't like this," he simply stated.

"No one does, not even me, but Lulu's right," Mia informed him as she closed her trunk. She understood, more than anyone, how he must feel about sending child over to a potentially dangerous situation. And she understood that, although reassurance didn't take the feeling away, it wasn't all that bad to hear. "I'll be careful and I'll be fine. I'm not going there to pick a fight with Snape and the Carrows – I'm going to protect my daughter and my students."

"With people like that around, that might not be easy. Or safe," he told her, not particularly trying to discourage her rather than just warn her.

"It's what needs to be done. Wouldn't you do the same if you were in my position?"

He huffed, frustrated that she'd asked that question. He had no choice but to agree and, therefore, completely lose his point. "I guess I would. But I still don't like it," he mumbled before walking off, finding himself defeated. The only thing he could do at the moment was cursing those 'blasted Death Eaters' under his breath as he walked out of the room.

"Don't mind him," Lulu told Mia when they were left alone. "He's got an auror complex – doesn't think any civilian can handle themselves as well as he does."

Mia sighed. "You know it's not just that. I feel exactly the same way about sending Izzy back and Merlin knows it was the same with Harry. Gabe is like me or… I'm like him. Overprotective – I guess that's what we are." She sat down and took a breath. "I wish I could be more like you in this department. You're just so… practical with this kind of thing."

"Yeah, well," the other woman mumbled, "don't you _dare_ make me swallow my own words later on." Or, in translation, _'don't you dare get killed or even harmed over there and make me sorry I didn't bug you enough'_.

"I hope I won't," Mia simply replied. "I can't make any promises, Lu. This is dangerous stuff. This…" she paused and looked up. "Am I doing the right thing?"

"About what?"

"Everything. Letting Izzy go back, going with her, aband… leaving Alex and Mary here with Sirius… Should we just have picked another path? Keeping her home even if she didn't want that, go into hiding or…"

"Run away for the rest of your life?" Lulu inquired. "That's no way to live, Mia. And Izzy is not a child – she has a right to choose her fate and you have to understand it if she chooses not to become a fugitive or to fight for the people she loves. As for leaving the little ones with Sirius, 'abandoning' is the farthest thing from what you're doing."

"Is it?" Mia asked. "Because it doesn't feel that way. They're still so little…"

"Yes, they're little and I'm sure leaving them feels like pulling teeth but the right thing to do isn't always easy. You've got another kid to take care of, one's who's heading to a much stickier situation than hopefully her brother and sister will ever find themselves in. And you and Sirius… you are a team. A great team that wouldn't trust the things they love most with anyone more than they do with each other. So maybe when you're at Hogwarts and he's over here you'll miss each other and the kids but there's one thing you'll always know – that they couldn't be safer or better cared than with who they are. Am I wrong about this?"

Her daughter sighed and looked down for a moment before sadly shaking her head. "No."

"Good. Then hold on to that," Lulu told her. "Trust him… trust _us _to hold this side fort. You need to worry about your own side now… and about putting yourself together. Put your best brave face on and don't let them see you're scared too – least of all Izzy. She's already bummed enough as it is with you going with her."

"Is that what you're doing?" she found herself asking her mother. "Putting on a brave face for me?"

The other woman raised her eyebrows at the question. "You should know by now that I'll never tell."

Mia sighed. "You'll keep an eye on them for me, won't you? Sirius and the kids. I know what's like to handle two kids that age. They're only going to turn into more of a handful."

Lulu gave her an annoyed look. "Just the fact that you need to ask is insulting. You know what? Go find someone else to ask unnecessary questions to. I'm going to find Gabe," she declared, unceremoniously making her way out.

Left alone in the room, Mia got up and took a moment to walk around her room before going out herself. She'd miss home. It was a silly thing to think, among all other things she'd miss. But Lulu was right – she had to trust Sirius to hold that side of the fort as she'd have her own to handle in the shape of Hogwarts. It still disturbed her to think of it as something now they needed to protect their children from when, only a few months before, it had been the safest place for anyone to be.

As soon as she stepped into the hallway, her husband's voice reached her ears, coming from Alex's room, where he seemed to be talking to the little boy. Inside, she found him crouching by their son's side, apparently helping him building a tower of blocks about the same height as the two-and-a-half-year-old boy. Alex had, she couldn't help noticing, been unusually quiet ever since she and Sirius had tried to explain to him that she was going to be away for a while.

From his spot, her husband looked up as soon as he heard her stepping in. "Ready to go?" he asked.

She nodded. "I've just finished checking if I had everything. The trunk's in our bedroom. Mary?"

"Still sleeping like a rock last time I checked," he told her, sighing tiredly as he motioned to stand up. "Could've used her that way a few hours ago."

Mia's lips curled a little when he made his way to her and paused for just a moment to place a little kiss on her lips, which she eagerly returned. But, just as she realized their separation meant they wouldn't be able to share little moments like those in a daily basis, she felt herself being hit by a wave of sadness, which she promptly fought back. _Brave face, _she reminded herself.

"I'll go take the trunk downstairs for you, okay?" he said.

She nodded and watched as her husband made his way along the corridor and disappeared into their room before walking towards their little son. He kneeled on the floor by the tower he'd built with his Dad, focusing on building a second one since he could reach the top of the first. When she sat by his side and ran her hand through his soft black hair, her little boy turned to her with the most heartbreakingly sad grey eyes she'd ever seen. It took all the self-control she had for her to keep a straight face, let alone willing herself to offer him an 'everything is going to be fine' sort of smile.

"Why so sad, my little prince?" she asked.

He shrugged at first, apparently unwilling to share but, as she sat quietly with him, handing him the building blocks for the second tower, he finally spoke. "You goin' away, Mama," he said in a little voice.

She pursed her lips together. "Mummy has to, baby," she whispered, her hand caressing his cheek softly. They'd been through all that before but he was just too little to fully understand it.

"But I wan'you here," he mumbled, looking down.

She could have just burst into tears right then and there. "I wish I could. But I have to go. Izzy needs me now. You don't want her to be all alone, do you? She'd get sad."

He shook his head. His older sister was one of his favourite people in the world. "When you gonna come back, Mama?"

"I don't know. As soon as Mama can, baby. But I've already promised that I'll speak to you every night in Daddy's mirror. You can tell me all about your day then. How does that sound?" It terrified her that he might throw a tantrum. That he might put his little foot down and demand that she stayed. Merlin knew it would break her heart even more to go, then.

Alex wasn't fully satisfied with the whole arrangement, even though he'd found himself altogether enchanted by the mirror itself ever since his parents had shown him how it worked a few days before. Even though it wasn't even close to the same as having his mummy around, using the mirror (even if his daddy was always the one actually handling it) was, in his toddler-sized mind, the most fascinating thing in the world, mostly because it was sort of a mystery. He liked mysteries. Of course, he liked Mummy much more. But he liked Izzy too, so he didn't want her sad and alone when she was away. Plus, he'd stay with Daddy, who'd always make really funny games with him. And Kreacher, who'd secretly give him cookies every once in a while. But he'd still miss Mummy, who told him the best stories at night. It was all too much of a dilemma (although he was still years away from knowing what that meant) in his young mind. So, instead of answering, he reached over for a cuddle since it always seemed to solve everything for him.

Mia sighed and enveloped the little boy with her arms, motioning to stand up with him. He rested his head against her shoulder and she rubbed his back in response, just walking around with him for a few moments. The smell of his hair, the warmth of his little body… it always seemed to calm her down. It broke her heart knowing that one day he'd be too big for that. That she wouldn't be able to soothe him and herself with little things like cuddles.

"You're gonna be a good boy for Daddy, aren't you?" she asked her son at some point.

"'m a good boy," he mumbled in return, not really getting (or, more likely, not _wanting to_ get) why anyone would imply otherwise.

His mother smiled a little. "Well, try to be an even better one while Mummy's away. And try not to smuggle too many cookies out of Kreacher – they'll give you a tummy ache."

"I wike cookies," he simply replied, clearly not making any promises.

Mia let out a chuckle and kissed his brow. Her sweet, mischievous boy. Harry, she thought with a pang in her heart, had been like that once. Sweet, mischievous and constantly bickering with an equally mischievous Izzy. It seemed like such a big jump from the careless, happy little boy to the young man forced to be on the run that he was today. She could only hope the still small little boy she was holding wouldn't have to go through even half of what Harry had so far.

"Mistress," she suddenly heard Kreacher's familiar voice saying from behind her. She turned around and saw him standing at the door, looking a bit down. "Master Sirius and Young Mistress all ready downstairs. Does Mistress want Kreacher to tell them to wait?"

She shook her head. "No, that's okay. I'll be right down," she said as she put Alex down and kneeled in front of him. "It's time, honey. Mummy has to go, okay?"

He frowned a little but nodded anyway, to Mia's relief. She placed one last kiss on the top of his head and was a little surprised when he reached over to give her a sloppy one in return on her face.

She smiled at him, brushing a strand of dark hair away from her eyes. "Alright," she whispered. "You'd better go back to building your tower. Kreacher will help, won't he?" she asked, turning around to see the house-elf still at the door.

Kreacher nodded, approaching the little boy. "Kreacher help Young Master Alex. Young Master be great builder."

Mia's lips curled. "Then I expect this tower will be as tall as Daddy when I come back," she said.

The little boy shook his head. "Bigga!" he announced, quite determinedly putting himself to work with Kreacher.

Walking away was the hardest part as she kept wanting to come back to hold her boy some more and potentially never let go.

Thankfully, the farewell with Mary was easier as, when paused by the nursery to check on the infant she was still asleep. To be honest, she didn't think she had it in her to let go of Mary too if she gave her one of those luminous smile, completely oblivious to what was going on and just wanting everyone to smile back at her. A kiss on the top of the baby's head and a wish of sweet dreams had to do the job, although part of her yearned for so much more.

She exited the room just barely managing the brave face Lulu had instructed her to keep in place and made her way down the stairs holding on to it. As she finally reached the ground floor, she found Izzy sitting on the last steps beside her trunk as her mother and Gabe spoke quietly nearby and Sirius stood in silence by the front door.

As soon as she spotted her mother, though, Izzy got to her feet and decided to go for her last shot at trying to convince her to change her mind about going back to Hogwarts. Before she could even open her mouth, though, Mia was already shutting her down.

"Don't even try, Izzy," she warned.

"But Mum…" Izzy moaned.

"I'm not changing my mind," Mia assured her.

Defeated, Izzy huffed and sunk onto her trunk, on top of which she sat in silence while Mia turned to her husband and gave him a look that was clearly the signal for them to go.

"You sure you don't want to wait a little longer?" he asked, checking his watch. "There's still plenty of time before the train leaves."

Mia shook her head. "It's best if we get there with time to spare." _And make it quick before I change my mind,_ she added in her head. "It will give us time to deal with anything unexpected."

He sighed. "Alright, then."

"Got everything you need, Izzy?" Mia asked her daughter, who grumbled something unintelligible in return before making her way to her grandparents for the last-minute goodbyes. Taking that as a 'yes', Mia made her way to her husband who gave her a really bad reassuring look. He was trying, she thought. It couldn't be easy for him either.

"So, this is it?" he asked.

"This is it."

It was the oddest thing.

Of all the things Izzy expected to bother her that day, the thought of walking into King's Cross for the first time without Harry by her side hadn't been one of them. It wasn't particularly for the reason _why _he wasn't there, rather than the fact that he simply wasn't there. It felt alien, even upsetting when in all honesty it had always been an inevitability, war or no war. He was one year ahead of her – eventually there would come a time when he'd graduate and she'd still have a year to finish at school.

She guessed it was about the routine, about it being one of the most normal things they'd always been able to do, regardless of him being a target, the boy-who-lived or simply Harry. When they boarded the train, they were simply a family, in all their confusion, all the havoc of packing and arriving on the station on time.

One of the things that hit her the most was the lack of her mother's check-list. Harry was a mess when it came to cleaning, putting anything away or even packing. He always forgot something. It was chronic, no matter how much her mother lectured him to check his trunk. So, every time it was going-back-to-school day, she would have to grill him endlessly on whether he'd brought everything that time, going through every item he was supposed to bring, from his books to his toothbrush or even his socks. Izzy, of course, would tease him endlessly for his forgetfulness and Harry, obviously, would bark back at her for being annoying.

Little moments that were completely independent from how screwed up the world might be. She missed those moment. And she missed him. A lot. She hadn't really given herself much of chance to think of it with everything that had been happening lately, her mother deciding to join her at Hogwarts being the last of them.

She hated that. She hated that so much. It was like the whole plan to go back, fight for their side was backfiring right on her face. Part of her actually wished she'd just stayed quiet and accepted her parents' initial plan to keep her home. Of course, that part was easily crushed when she connected staying home to a potential future in Azkaban…

She sighed and shook her head, realizing as she walked after her parents across the crowds of people still in the Muggle part of the station that she might as well be crying over spilled milk. It was useless. Yet, before she actually had the chance to shift her attention back to where she was going, her trolley hit her father's legs as her mother crashed into a heavily cloaked, slightly familiar dark-skinned man that gave her mother an odd look, blurted an apology and walked away.

What was that?

"Mum, what…?" she started to ask.

Her mother turned back to her and shook her head. "It's nothing, honey. Let's just keep walking," she said hurriedly before turning her face away and starting to fiddle with something that had suddenly found its way into her hands.

Obviously, 'nothing' wasn't really _nothing_, as her parents immediately started whispering amongst each other. How clueless did they think she was? Because, unless her eyes had been fooling her, she was sure the 'stranger' they'd crashed into just then had been Kingsley Shacklebolt, although why he'd been impersonating a Muggle was a mystery to her.

She ended up having to let the mystery slide, though, as they quickly reached the passage to platform 9 ¾ and she, as well as her secretive parents, needed to concentrate on finding a way to pass through it without all the Muggles noticing, which was rather hard because the place was packed.

By the time they did manage to cross the passage, several minutes later, they found the platform rather full even though the train wasn't supposed leave for little more than half hour.

Just as her mother greeted Professor Flitwick – who, along with several other teachers such as Sprout, Vector and even Trelawney, seemed to be planning to ride on the Hogwarts Express rather than apparating to the school as they'd always done, for all she knew – she spotted the Weasleys arriving as well. Not just Ginny and her parents, as she'd imagined it would be.

Fred and (much more importantly at least in her ridiculously crush-infected mind) _George_ had come along. Not just them, really, she'd end up noticing a few seconds later, as Bill and Fleur quickly followed the party, promptly tailed by Charlie. _All _of the Weasleys (at least those not on the run while pretending to be inflicted with some infectious disease) were there and, while it was sweet in a protective sort of way that they were all sticking together to have each other's backs, Ginny didn't look all that happy about the fact that she'd been assigned some sort of extended security detail. Izzy could relate – it occurred to her that it really was a relief to have her around again… finally she'd have someone other than her parents and her barely-out-of diapers younger siblings to talk to.

While Molly and Arthur quickly joined her parents and Bill and Charlie soon saw themselves distracted by an old acquaintance, to whom they seemed to be introducing Fleur, Izzy took the chance to excuse herself from her parents and join her best friend and the twins a little further away from the train.

"Well, well, Gin-Gin, look who's here, Miss Izzy Black," Fred said loudly just as he spotted her approaching before anyone else did, prompting Ginny and George to turn to her, the first simply huffing in annoyance at the use of the nickname and the second offering her a quick smile just as he saw her. "How lovely to see you, as always, of course _for some more than others_," Fred continued, his statement followed by a mysterious yelp that she suspected might be connected to the sudden look of annoyance on George's face.

"So," Ginny observed, her lips curling slightly as she ignored her brothers' antics, "I see you did make it here today."

Although she'd had close to no contact to her best friend in the past month, it didn't come unnoticed to Izzy how there was something off with her general demeanour. She couldn't quite point a finger at what it was in specific that gave it away but it was certainly there – the inevitable layer of sadness and concern.

To be honest, Izzy had to admit, it was a pretty convincing casual look for anyone who didn't know Ginny as well as she did – certainly a very impressive achievement for someone was faced with the impossible situation of having her boyfriend on the run while at the same time needing to pretend she didn't really care about that fact since, as far as everyone knew, they'd bitterly ended their relationship months before. But, as much as she tried to hide those feelings, they were still there. Ginny might still try to act as the forceful, independent and lively Ginny they all knew and loved – no doubt she'd use every last shred of her energy to keep it up… but something was missing. Under the shadow of Harry's absence, the spark was gone. For anyone who knew Ginny well, that made all the difference.

"What? Don't' tell me you thought I'd cave," Izzy said in reply, raising an eyebrow as she tried to mimic her friend's forced casualness.

"I thought your parents might," the redhead pointed out. "I mean, Mum did. Twice today alone – I won't even get to how many times she did it this week… I stopped counting by the time it passed the dozen and that was, like, last Thursday."

Izzy sighed, looking down. "Yeah, well, believe it or not, while my parents didn't change their minds a million times – at least not openly – they did worse."

"Worse?" George asked, raising an eyebrow. "How exactly does that work? Did they try to lock you in the basement or something? Chain you to wall?" He frowned. "I really can't picture them doing that…"

"Well, they didn't. Once again, they did even worse – my Mum is going along. To Hogwarts. In a _full-time_ basis," she declared.

Ginny gave her a blank look. "Really? Snape didn't fire her? Wait, are they _making_ her go back?"

"No," Izzy said, balling her hands into fists. "This one's actually all on me."

"Don't be ridiculous, Isabelle," George told her. "Your Mum has a mind of her own – if she's going back, it's because she wants to."

"And she wants to because I'm going too," she pointed out, giving him an angry look.

"Well, given the most recent laws, you wouldn't really have much of a choice not to," he pointed out. "Between Hogwarts and Azkaban, I'd risk saying the choice is pretty obvious."

He had a point. _Again. _He always seemed to do lately… or maybe the stupid crush had just hard-wired her mind to instinctively agree with him. It was hard to keep up with it, really. In any case, she wasn't happy about it, so she looked away from him without saying a word, not wanting to go on with that talk…

Ginny crossed her arms, sighing. "Well, it's pretty clear this year's going to suck for everyone and I'm pretty sure we're not even the ones at the worst end of this bargain. Have you heard the new laws they've been putting up since Umbridge got on charge? Prison for Muggle-borns, more and more limitations for 'half-breeds'… it's disgusting."

"We get new penalty fees every week now for having Remus working for us," Fred mumbled. "He's been making noises about us needing to let him go because of that. Like we don't make enough profits to pay at least ten of those penalties _a day…"_

George nodded in agreement, rolling his eyes. "Obviously we've been telling him to shut up and go get his head ch…" He was interrupted by a loud, dramatic sob coming from a woman standing nearby, hugging the life out of a scrawny kid around thirteen or fourteen. "Merlin," he mumbled as the woman kept sobbing.

"I guess we'd better move to somewhere else," Fred said, looking around. "Look, _there,_" he indicated, pointing at an empty area only a few yards away that provided access to some out-of-order toilets, mostly covered by the presence of a wide column between it and the widely crowded area right by the train.

They all nodded in agreement at the choice of location, relieved to step away from the loud and awkward situation going on where they stood, not to mention the growing crowd in general.

"So," George said, just as they reached the new location. "Where was I?"

"Something about Remus," Ginny provided.

"Ah, yes, Remus. Yeah, he's nuts if he thinks we'll _ever _sack him – he should know better than anyone that we'd rather shove something sharp into our ears than make our own accounting or handle the legal stuff when it comes to putting new stuff in the market. Who else would we find that has at the same time a freakishly organized mind and a perfect understanding of our line of work as a former Marauder?"

"Plus, we kind of need him to keep us from starving when we're too busy designing some new product to even think of fetching anything to eat or drink for that matter," Fred added, earning looks of disbelief from both Izzy and Ginny. "What? We're creative minds – we don't have time to think of mundane things when we're inspired."

"Mundane things like _eating_?" Izzy asked in disbelief

"There's something wrong with you," Ginny stated, looking at her brothers like they were insane. "Are you Weasleys or what?"

"It's not like it happens every week," George said, rolling his eyes. "And, besides, we're not discussing our eating habits or working methods, are we? You're starting to sound suspiciously like Mum."

Before Ginny could even reply, though, she heard her name being called.

"_Ginny?_" Someone's voice – Molly, coincidence or not – called. "_Ginny, where are you?_"

The redhead huffed, turning to glare at George like her being called away was his entire fault.

"What? Don't look at me like that," he stammered. "It's not like mentioning Mum makes her show up out of thin air!"

"Oh, if she changed her mind again…" Ginny said under her breath as Fred put his hands on her shoulders.

"Come on, Gin-Gin, I'll go along for moral support," her brother said, turning to his twin trying to keep a grin away from his face – that was simply the perfect opportunity to make a convenient exit. "You go ahead and keep Izzy here some _company_. I'll call out for you if I need reinforcements to handle Mum," he said, already carting his little sister away.

"Fred! Stop pushing me!" she complained.

"Move along, then. Before Mum sends a search party after you," he said, suspiciously grinning back at puzzled George and Izzy before he disappeared behind the wide column, dragging Ginny along.

The look George shot at the spot where his brother had been standing just a second before clearly said 'I am going to _kill_ you'. Not, he added in his mind, that he was particularly horrified by the prospect of spending time alone with Izzy. Knowing Fred would tease him endlessly for it later, however, was just something he did not like even a little. The guy was simply insufferable when he was trying to prove something and that something, at the moment, was that he had a thing for Izzy. Which, as much as he hated to admit it, wasn't really that far-fetched a theory.

While part of him wanted to just walk away in order to prove Fred's attempt to get him and Izzy cosy a failure, the other was too deeply aware of that being the last time he'd see her for months to even consider wasting that opportunity to be with her. And the latter, turned out, weighed far much more than the first, he realized as his eyes landed on her quiet shape right in front of him.

"For Merlin's sake," George said, slightly annoyed by the long look that seemed to be plastered all over her face as she stared aimlessly at the floor, "please tell me you're not actually sulking because your Mum is going back to Hogwarts too."

"I'm not _sulking_, I'm frustrated," she muttered before looking up at him. "This is not how it was supposed to go. She was supposed to stay home, not to go back because of _me._"

"Hum, hum," George mumbled before clearing his throat like he was about to change the subject. "_Completely_ unrelated – remember what I said about us all being a big, happy bunch of hypocrites? Welcome to the family, Isabelle."

Izzy shot him an annoyed look. "That not fair," she said, leaning against the column behind her.

"Isn't it? Let's see… your mum and your dad tried to keep you home for your own safety and instead you fought kicking and screaming until they agreed to let you go under the condition that your Mum's going along. And now what do _you _do? You don't want her to go because think it's safer for her to stay."

"It's not just that," she said. "She's got kids to take care of at home – Alex and Mary need her much more than I do. They're little, they…"

"They have your dad to look after them. And your grandparents, I bet. I'm sure if my Mum can, she'll lend a hand too," George replied. "Plus, they're not bound to be regularly around Death Eaters at home. If your Mum thought she'd be more needed at home than with you, she'd stay. So, maybe you don't need to be spoon-fed or tucked in at night anymore – doesn't mean you couldn't use a parent around. Merlin, mine and Fred's place would be a complete dump if Mum didn't show up every once in a while to guilt us into cleaning a little."

Izzy huffed, although his words made her feel just a little better. Not that, deep down, she didn't know all of that. The thing was, when he said it, it made so much more sense. "I still could've handled myself."

"Probably," he agreed. "Personally, I find it a good thing that you don't have to find out."

She frowned. "Which side are you on?"

At the moment, he had to admit, it was pretty hard to tell. He couldn't really say he was fully on Izzy's side or on her parents'– personally, he found himself in a category of his own. "Let's call it the 'concerned friend's side'," he decided for arguments' sake. "As in friends stick with other friends but they also worry about them, as any sane person would. You're not exactly headed for a holiday on the beach, you know?"

She mumbled something under her breath that he took as a stubborn 'I know' and looked down at the floor, awarding her shoes with her undivided attention. It had happened again: she's known, or at least she had some idea of what she was headed to at Hogwarts, she'd know it wasn't pretty; yet only when he actually said it did it really hit her. It was confusing how his words could garner reactions out of her that her own thoughts would not. And, that one time, also unpleasant, as her nerves started to catch up with her.

At some point, as she felt his eyes on her but refused to meet them, Izzy found herself absently tapping her foot on the floor as a nervous twitch to channel her anxiety. "What time is it?" she asked out of the blue.

George checked his watch. "Twenty minutes until the train leaves," he said.

"Right," Izzy mumbled, peaking over her shoulder at the train with a strange sensation of emptiness in her stomach as she did so. Fifteen minutes. Somehow knowing she'd be on her way to a Death Eater-run school in a matter of minutes made it all so much more real… she could see herself starting to panic.

"Hey," she heard George saying, his hand brushing against her arm. By that time, he'd had enough of watching her slowly simmering in her own worries in silence.

The touch made her feel slightly giddy as she turned around in a flash, her eyes meeting his in the process. Butterflies were at a civil war in her stomach, making her swallow hard. Had he been that close just a few seconds ago? Because she felt like he was standing impossibly close – she ought to have noticed it before.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I…" She couldn't seem to find her voice. What the hell? _Speak! Do it like the rational being you are – if your two-year-old brother can, so can you! _She swallowed hard and took a breath. "I'm… I'm scared," she said, barely whispering, unable to keep the truth from slipping out. "I know it's stupid – I fought and fought so I could go back to Hogwarts and now…" She laughed nervously. "Doesn't even make sense, I know. But it just seems so… real now. It's stupid."

"No, it isn't," he told her in a strangely serious tone that caused her all the more to feel… gooey. Later she'd think the reaction was utterly embarrassing. "Honestly, I'd think you were a bit loopy if you weren't even slightly scared of what you're about to walk into. Merlin knows I'd be too, although you wouldn't catch me dead admitting it to just anyone. It doesn't make you a coward or anything. But listen: if you really feel like this is too much for you, like you're biting much more than you can chew, just say the word and we're out of here. There's still time and no one would blame you, least of all me."

She'd barely even registered the words and she was already shaking her head. Izzy took that as a sign. "No. Just… no. I'm not changing my mind at the last minute. It's just cold feet. I can get over it. But thanks, anyway."

"You're more than welcome," he replied. "And look, if you ever… need someone and… well… that someone just happens to be no one you have around, just ask Ginny for the 'secret item' Fred and I gave her. She'll fill you in the rest."

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "'Secret item'? Should I be scared?"

George looked thoughtful for a moment. "Not really… provided you wear some sort of protective suit when you use it because it tends to spew acid all over you – really nasty business," he said, trying to keep his face as straight as he could, although she could see him nearly failing once or twice. "But, yeah, if you take precautions, you should be mostly safe. I mean, what's a fifty per cent chance of it eating you whole, anyway?"

She couldn't help letting out a loud laugh before she even had a chance to cover her mouth. She hadn't felt like laughing that way in a very long time – he could lift her spirits like nobody else. "I kind of wish you were going too," she heard herself saying before realizing she'd spoken at all. _What? Shut up!_ she yelled in her mind. But she didn't. "Er… I mean, because we could always use an extra pair of hands if things end up getting too sticky," she said, trying to cover after her apparent lack of ability to keep her mouth shut.

George shrugged. "I'd probably go too if, you know, Fred and I hadn't already made such a monumental exit." If not for anything else, he thought, he'd do so to keep an eye on her. She was going – there was nothing he could do about it. But that didn't mean it didn't make him nervous, although he simply refused to let it show. He didn't think he had a right to. "Hogwarts was always fun… if you take out the schooling part, of course. And, anyway, just the chance of being near enough to the Carrows to give them grief on a daily basis is enough of a prospect…" he said, trying to sound excited about it, even though the thought of _her _sharing a roof with those people made him want to punch something really hard. "Not that I find it a smart idea for you to regularly pick on a bunch of sadistic Death Eaters, let me add."

"What? You're telling me to behave too? Because I'm not an idiot or anything – I won't go looking for trouble if I don't have to," she pointed out.

"The troublemaker in me insists that I point out that behaving is overrated," he told her, glad that, at least, her words let it show she wasn't planning to do something terribly idiotic. "As long as you're smart about what you do and have a certain… item that requires you to be up to no good at hand's reach, you can get away with a lot," he told her. "I assume you have said item on you."

She did and patted her jeans' pocket as confirmation she currently had the Marauders' Map in it. "I'm not completely green in this whole 'being sneaky' thing, you know? And neither is Ginny," she replied before they heard a new wave of loud voices joining the platform – likely people who'd chosen not to come until the last minute. She looked over her shoulder, trying to spot the nearest clock in the platform.

"Fifteen minutes," George informed her, guessing her thought.

She turned back to him, sighing, her eyes on the floor. "Right… I guess I should probably start thinking of going, shouldn't I?"

George nodded, though he didn't really say anything. In her turn, Izzy just stood there, as if she was waiting for him to have the last word. The farewell somehow didn't seem complete without him doing so – maybe she just needed a little final joke for the trip…

But, as seconds passed, he still didn't say anything. It made her feel uneasy and she found herself looking up, only to find him looking straight at her. As grey met blue, she found herself, once again, painfully aware of how close he was standing to her – she was, essentially, trapped between him and a hard place, the latter being the uncomfortably cold pillar against her back. Neither George nor Fred were ever the tallest of the Weasleys but he still managed to tower over her by several inches – inches she simply refused to convert to feet –, which made her feel even more awkward standing there… She could only imagine what sort of image anyone would run into if they spotted them – she should count herself lucky that the particular spot they were standing on was out of virtually everyone'd sights.

She gulped, rather uncomfortable. "George, what…?"

He shook his head and she went silent. What did _that _mean? Was he telling her to be quiet?

"I think I'm about to do something really stupid," he suddenly confessed, his face so close to hers she could actually feel his breath on her face. Good grief, what the hell was going on? She could feel herself moments away from going limp. "Do us both a favour and blame it on the whole farewell situation later on."

She raised her eyebrows. "Blame what on…?" She was cut midsentence by his lips landing straight on hers.

_Wait, what?_ Her mind went blank for a few fractions of a second just before starting questioning itself if what she thought was happening was _actually _happening. He was kissing her. On the lips. And she was pretty sure it was _on purpose_.

She practically had to force herself to snap out of the shock in order to actually enjoy the event in question. It wasn't like she could afford to assume that was something that would happen often – better enjoy it while it lasted, then.

He was good. Very good, although, she'd later admit to herself, her perception of his performance might have been fairly increased by her own excitement. She could positively say she'd never been so thrilled by a kiss in her whole life and she'd done it quite a lot in the past, although lately she'd been going to a sort of dry spell…

"_Izzy? Izzybel?" _she suddenly heard her father's voice asking in the distance, making them all but jump away from each other._ "Where did that girl go? She was just standing over there a few minutes ago…_"

And, just as their lips parted, the shock returned, making her just stand there, looking wide-eyed at anything _but _his face. She would have taken one, two steps back if it wasn't for the stupid column she was leaning against. If only it could… absorb her. Allow her to hide in it to have her freak-out moment out of everyone's sight, specifically George's…

"I think that was your dad," he said, a bit lamely as he took quite a large step back.

She nodded. "Yeah. So…" She paused, gulped. _Say something. _"See you at Christmas?" The question was made extra awkward by the fact that she simply couldn't bring herself to look at his face_._ _I must look like a lunatic,_ she thought in the back of her mind. A lunatic experiencing a mild panic attack. What was wrong with her?

"Christmas," he replied with a nod, seeming quite tongue-tied himself. "Well…"

"I'd better go," she declared more loudly than she'd intended, slipping away from the column. "Before Dad loses it. So… er… bye." And, with that, she turned on her heel and started to walk away, positively mortified.

"Wait, Isabelle," George called only after a few steps, making her turn back around. That time, with the distance between them, she had absolutely no excuse to avert his eyes. He hesitated for a few seconds before saying something else, like he hadn't really planned that part when he'd called her back. "Don't… don't forget the golden rule, okay? Whatever you do, don't get caught," he stammered, uncharacteristically nervous.

She found herself giving him an odd look. "I don't plan to," she replied before going quiet for a few moments… and then hearing her father calling again, hurrying her to go. Her eyes burned into George's one last time because somehow it was the only thing that kept hers from obsessively focusing on his lips. Part of her really wanted to kiss him again because it has felt so good before. Silly girl. "Goodbye, George," she finally said.

He shook his head for some reason, and then offered her a partial smile. "_See you later_, Isabelle."

His tone made the butterflies in her stomach impossibly active again as she turned around and walked away a final time.

Of course, soon enough her brain was plagued with questions about the meaning of the kiss. Could it mean her crush might not be so ridiculous after all? Could he possibly li… She stopped herself before finishing that thought. What was she doing? _Don't read into it,_ she told herself sternly. _Don't read into any of it. He called it 'something stupid'. He said to blame it on the farewell. So don't even dare reading into it. Just count yourself lucky it happened. From now on there's no risk of you dying without having kissed him at least once._ That was a stupid thing to think, yet strangely comforting at the same time. It wasn't like she was headed to certain death or anything. Still, she could certainly scratch that out of her bucket list, not that she actually had one.

"Where have you been?" her father asked just as she reached him.

She gulped. "Er… the loo," she mumbled, which wasn't particularly a lie. She'd been near a loo… the thing was, it was out of order. If there was anything in the world that could keep her mind from obsessively darting back to the kiss, it had to be her father's presence. Just thinking of it around him made her helplessly embarrassed.

Sirius sighed. "Right, well, give me a little warning next time, will you?"

"Sorry," she mumbled with a nod. "I suppose it's almost time, isn't it?"

Her father nodded. "Any last words?"

_How about last requests instead?_ she thought as she looked up at her father with pleading eyes. "Daddy, can you do something for me?"

He raised his eyebrows. He knew that look – it was the 'kindly wrap yourself around my little finger' look. "Depends on what it is," he offered.

"Get Mum, scoop her off the floor and take her away from here. Don't let her do this – she's supposed to stay."

Sirius sighed and shook his head. "Sorry, Izzybel. She made me promise I'd either take both of you or none. She's not the only one who's supposed to stay."

To be honest, Izzy thought, pursing her lips together, she hadn't been all that hopeful that he'd do what she asked. So, in theory, the disappointment shouldn't have been that crushing. _Shouldn't_ being the key word.

Taking a long breath, Izzy took a step forward and wrapped her arms around her father's form, her head resting on his shoulder as he held her back. "I'm sorry. I never meant for her to go back because of me."

She felt him shaking his head. "Don't be sorry. Be careful. And keep in mind that we'll always do anything to protect you – that's something we'll never regret.

Izzy closed her eyes and felt herself tightening her hold on him as he just kept rubbing her back in silence. They didn't really do anything else for what to be two or three minutes. Only when an extra hand found its way to her shoulder did Izzy open her eyes to find her mum standing there.

"It's almost time, honey," Mia said. "Ginny's already gone in."

Izzy nodded and pulled away from her father a little, instead looking up at him. "Try not to lose your mind without us."

He smiled. "It's always a holiday when you're not around, Izzybel," he assured her, before leaning down to place a kiss on her forehead, getting one on his cheek in return. Then, as Mia stood by them, pretending not to hear their little farewell, he spoke to his daughter in all seriousness. "Remember what I told you. Don't be me. Don't make me the guy who loses a kid."

Her eyes opened wide at the notion itself and she had to bite her lip to keep herself together. "Don't make me the girl who loses a Dad," she replied. And, with that, she took a step back and made her way into the entrance of the train. When she stepped in, she joined Ginny and countless other students at the window looking out to spot their parents.

From where he stood, Sirius waved at her once, then turned his attention to his wife, whose eyes seemed moist at the moment as she tried to hide them by looking down at the floor.

He reached for her face with his hand, tilting it up until her reddening eyes met his, and then, uncaring of audience, his lips met hers in a slow, sweet kiss that lasted for what seemed minutes to them, mere seconds to the rest of the world.

When they broke apart, her eyes, although still marred by tears, didn't avert his. "Take care of our babies, okay?"

He nodded. "Take care of our girl. And yourself. I'd rather have a well-kept wife to come back to me."

She nodded, biting her lip before letting out a sigh. "I hate this. I hate it so much."

"Me too," he told her. "But it won't be like last time." And thinking of last time, all those years apart, still made him go cold inside. "I won't let it. We'll talk every day. Do you have the mirror on you?"

She nodded. "I've got it in my pocket. Sirius, promise you won't let yourself do something really reckless without me around. Promise you won't go running on your own after the Death Eaters or You-Know-Who himself."

He sighed. "I'm not insane."

"You are. A little," she said, her lips curling slightly. "That's one of the reasons why I love you so much."

He smiled and reached for her hand, bringing it to his lips. "I love you too. Insanely," he added, making her chuckle softly. "I'll do whatever I can to be alive and in one piece when you come back to me."

She hit his shoulder softly. "You'd better," she warned him just as the train let out a loud whistle, urging the last passengers that were still on the platform to board the train. And, as everyone started to move towards it, Sirius pulled her into yet another kiss, the last they'd share for some time.

They let themselves afford a last moment holding each other before a cloud of steam covered the platform, informing them their time had run out. They couldn't steal any more moments.

When Mia pulled away, her lips thinly pursed to keep herself from falling apart, he already felt at loss. When she stepped into the train, it was like a limb had been ripped apart from his body. And so, as the train gained speed on its way out of the platform, for the second time in his life, he felt the loneliest person in the world.

**A/N2 - Well, I hope you liked this pretty eventful chapter and that it was worth the wait. I'll admit the kiss even caught _me _by surprised because I wasn't planning to have it happen until after the Battle of Hogwarts... as I said, these things just seem to get a life of their own. Feedback is so very welcome. Review!**

**P.S: You can expect the next outtake to this fic to come out sometime soon, this one from Fred and George's POV, as part of _Outtakes: The Companion to the Brave New... Series._ So far, writing this one has been a racket,**


	52. Infiltration

**A/N: Happy New Year, everyone! Here is a brand new, freakishly long chapter... I won't comment on that part since I seem to be chronically suffering from long-chapter disease. For those who didn't notice it, I posted the long promised Fred/George outtake on my profile a few weeks ago - feel free to check it since you won't be seeing much of George in this chapter...**

**8 September 1997**

"That chicken's already dead, you know? No need to stab it further before you eat it."

"Hum?" Izzy mumbled distractedly, her eyes watchfully glued on the staff-table, where the Carrows happily sat.

Ginny huffed as her best friend apparently prepared herself to stab the chicken leg on her plate once more. Before she could do it, though, Ginny snatched the fork away from her hand with a quick move that finally seemed to catch Izzy's attention. "Stop staring at them," she demanded in a whisper. "Or at least try to be less obvious about it."

"I don't trust them."

Ginny snorted. "I'd say nearly no one here does but they're not all staring. Just eat your dinner, will you? You're making me nervous."

She groaned. "I've lost my appetite… I always seem to when they're less than two-hundred feet away."

"Well, then get ready to starve yourself to death because they're going to be around a lot," Ginny pointed out.

Izzy groaned again as she snatched her fork back from Ginny and used it to take a bite from the chicken on her plate.

"You know, you've been acting awfully sulky lately," the redhead observed.

"Everyone's sulky these days," Izzy replied dismissively. "_You_'re sulky."

"No, _I_'m pissed. I'm pissed because the bad guys are in charge and I'm pissed because the good guy," _my guy, _she added in her mind, "is being chased like a criminal and has a bounty on his head." She was even more pissed because she hide from anyone just how much she cared for Harry or else no doubt they'd use her against him. That was something she wasn't willing to let happen in a million years. "But you, _you_'re sulky."

Izzy huffed. Well, of course she was sulky. She'd only been back to school for a week and so far it had been pretty crappy. Why? Because Hogwarts wasn't Hogwarts anymore. Not really. She'd been warned about that several times before she'd come, mostly by her parents, and she couldn't say she hadn't believed it. Of course thinking of it was nothing like living it.

She couldn't have really predicted a state of coldness and dampness in the air all over the castle mainly during the morning thanks to the Dementors that patrolled the hallways at night. She couldn't have predicted that now they would 'enjoy' two hours of torture every day in the shape of Dark Arts and (now mandatory) Muggle Studies, where the Carrows preached the most disturbing crap she'd ever heard in her life.. She couldn't have predicted how miserable her mother and all the other teachers would look as they were forced to teach their newly-reviewed syllabus matching the '_ministry's new views_'. And, finally, she couldn't have predicted herself and most of the oldest Gryffindors having to talk nightmares out of their first-year housemates nearly every night because of the things they were shown and told by the Carrows during class.

And, of course, to top all that was the fact that that, even though her mind was full enough on its own, it always seemed to find the time to get itself overthinking things that had no business coming up in a time like that. Like certain kisses shared on certain train platforms with certain redheads… She still hadn't gotten any closer to figure out what it had actually meant but, Merlin's pants, she was just setting herself up to lose her mind anyway. Why couldn't a kiss be just a kiss, as mind-blowing as it might have been? Why couldn't she stop thinking of it every night before she went to sleep and every morning before her mind had actually woken up?

"Look, I've got a lot in my hands too," Izzy found herself saying at some point. "And… well, I guess that makes me frustrated. And being frustrated makes me sulk. And sulking just frustrates me more… it's a vicious circle, Ginny. I can't help it."

Ginny huffed. "Well, as much as I like you, that's getting to my nerves. You need something to channel that frustration into – something other than sulking. Like… _networking_," giving her look that clearly said networking didn't actually mean _networking_. Well, in a way it did, only it was strictly applied to extend the number of members in the DA.

Getting it back on track was still a work very much on progress, seeing as so many members had graduated, been banished from the school as Muggle-borns or were currently on the run for different reasons… Rebuilding the old Defence Assotiation turned into Dumbledore's Army was never going to be easy – their only hope was that the nastier the Carrows got (and they were bound to get nastier), the more people would be willing to join in. It had been that way during Umbridge's reign – Izzy was sure it would be the same now.

"Girls," Neville greeted them quietly just as suddenly appeared, taking a seat opposite from them.

"Hey, where have you been?" Ginny asked in a concerned whisper. "Dinner's started being served nearly an hour ago."

"I got held up," he stated, carefully looking around to see if there were any students around who could overhear them. As it happened, there weren't – even with attendance made mandatory, only now did they realize just how heavy the weight of Muggle-Borns was in the schools' student body. Only the Slytherins had anything close to a full table these days. "Listen, I ran into Nick… you know, Nearly-Headless Nick. He told me a few things you both might be interested in."

"What?" Izzy whispered, mimicking the low tone he'd just taken.

Neville looked around once again, that time also to check if anyone was observing, which didn't seem to be the case at the moment. "He said he heard this conversation between Amycus and Alecto this morning by chance – said he had to tell one of us right away because he knows we're still on Harry's side and figured we could do something about it."

"Wait, so it is about Harry?" Ginny questioned anxiously. "What did they say?"

"Shh…" he said, urging her to loser her voice. "He said… he said he heard them mention a thing or two about something important that Snape's keeping in his office – something apparently You-Know-Who wants to keep away from Harry. Badly."

That same thought hit the two girls at the same time: could the thing in question be a Horcrux? Could they have a Horcrux so close to their reach inside the school? "Did he catch what it was?" Izzy asked, glancing again at the Staff table and noting vaguely, before her eyes landed on the Carrows, that her mother – who'd been sitting by McGonagall's side just before – seemed to have left dinner early. She wasn't the only one, though, as many teachers often avoided spending much time around their darkest co-workers. That time, even Snape seemed to be gone.

Neville shook his head before speaking and reclaiming Izzy's attention. "No – he said he'd keep on eavesdropping on them and Snape to try and find out but so far all he knew was what I've just told you. Apparently, the Carrows don't trust Snape to keep it safe even though You-Know-Who apparently does. They're pissed he didn't give it to them instead."

"Makes sense – they will never be any love lost between them and Snape," Ginny pointed out.

He nodded. "I figured Nick was reliable since he's always been on our side. I'm not sure how risky it is for him to be eavesdropping for us but it's a good thing he is. What do you reckon they were on about? A weapon of some sort? It has to be, right?"

"Maybe," Izzy mumbled. But, right now, she was hoping for a Horcrux – she really wanted to destroy one of those. She wasn't sure why in particularly since she wasn't quite certain about the 'how' in the equation anyway but she really wanted to.

"Well, it's pretty clear what we have to do," Ginny declared. "We need to figure out what it is… and then we need to get our hands on it."

Neither Izzy nor Neville disagreed with that one. Both of them knew that anything Voldemort wanted so badly to keep away from Harry, weapon or otherwise, was bound to be useful to him or to them. Given the item in question was on what they classified as their territory, it was up to them to take care of it, a risk they had to take.

When a few late students showed up a few moments later and occupied the seats right by them, the three decided to leave that matter for the moment, allowing it to be discussed at another time. With that settled, Izzy and Ginny left the Great Hall not long after, unwilling to spend any more time in the same room as the Carrows than they had to.

As Neville stayed behind finishing his dinner and chatting with Seamus Finnigan and a kid named Derek that was one year below them, the two girls made their way up the main staircase. With the echo of their footsteps as the only sound they heard aside from the voices in the increasingly distant Great Hall, they were reminded of how empty the hallways were – no one really wanted to be wandering around at that time of the day in case one of the Dementors decided to show up early for their post-curfew rounds, which had happened before.

Upon reaching the first floor, though, the silence was tainted by the sound of a pair of hushed, tense voices coming from the adjacent hallway. Familiar voices.

"Is that…?" Ginny started to ask.

Izzy nodded before her friend could even finish. It had taken her less than a second to identify the voices as her mother's and Snape's, which wasn't something she was very happy about. What that bastard wanted with her mother was something she couldn't imagine… "Come on," she urged her friend, nodding towards the corridor in question – either it was fuelled by curiosity or concern, she simply couldn't help wanting to figure out what that tense little conversation was about. A conversation taking place in a public area of the castle, of all places – how very much out of character for Snape, who barely did anything out of his office these days. For a moment, she wondered if that fact had anything to do with the secret item allegedly hidden in there…

Step by slow step, each carefully taken as to not produce any noise that could echo on the castle's stone walls, they made their way closer to the voices, which got clearer as they approached until finally settling right around the corner from the talking pair, strategically out of their sight.

"… _couldn't tell because you don't know or because you don't want to share?_" Snape's voice was asking

"_Because I don't know," _their heard Mia replying in a quite frustrated tone. "_As I've already told you."_

There was a sigh followed again by Snape's voice. "_It seems rather odd, wouldn't you say? That she wouldn't share her plans with you, her best friend._"

"_I'd call it smart, actually_," Mia pointed out, her tone much less annoyed that time, as if she was enjoying having the chance to say that. "_It seems quite obvious that questions would be asked after her daughter didn't show up at Hogwarts – I assume that by not saying anything she meant to avoid placing me in the awkward situation you're trying to create right now, Severus. But I don't imagine you'd understand how a good friendship works since you seem to have such an awful history in that matter._"

"_Mind your tongue, Amelia_," Snape replied, sounding tenser at that moment than Izzy had ever heard him. Clearly her mother knew the game she was playing. "_I don't appreciate having you channelling your husband's distasteful behaviour in my school. I imagined someone of your intellect would have gotten that from my dismissing him_."

"Your _school_," Mia repeated. "_You know, I've always heard that Hogwarts was faithful to those who are faithful to it. If I were you, I'd really oppose the notion of 'faithfulness' to what you've been up to lately and take some conclusions of my own." _

"_I'll take your advice under consideration," _he replied dryly. "_So, I suppose that's all you have to say about Ms Harper's situation_."

"_That's all I know_," she stated. "_Of course, if you doubt my word, you can always call me in for an official questioning and fetch some Veritaserum like you did last time_."

Snape let out a bored sigh. "_Veritaserum, Amelia, is a very hard potion to brew. It has rare and expensive ingredients that should not be wasted in every little matter. I'm sure you know there are a few dozen families in this situation._"

"_Yes, I do wonder why," _her mother told him in a dry tone. "_Well, you'll have to excuse me for the night – I have classes to prepare._"

And with that, as the headmaster stiffly agreed and his steps started to come their way, Izzy and Ginny looked at each other in a panic, realizing he was seconds away from finding them there. '_What do we do?_' Izzy mouthed to the redhead who scratched her head.

It was too late to try and sneak back to the stairs unnoticed, Ginny quickly concluded. At least without making noise. If only they had an invisibility cloak… but they hadn't. She supposed that only left them with another possibility. "Follow my lead," she whispered before taking a breath and stepping right into Snape's path, nearly crashing into him. "Oh, sorry, Professor, didn't see you there," Ginny said, trying to sound surprised by his appearance.

Snape frowned at her and then at Izzy, who promptly appeared behind Ginny. Her heart was racing as, at a distance, she could clearly see her mother standing in front of her office looking at them with a disapproving look on her face, as if she just knew they'd been eavesdropping… _Of course Mum knows, _she thought. She always did.

"Miss Weasley and, of course, Miss Black," Snape said in a stiff yet paced tone. "What, may I ask, are you two doing here on your own? I believe dinner is still being served…"

Ginny gulped. "We left early. We needed to have a word with Professor Black," she lied, nodding at Mia who just sighed. "About a pair assignment she gave us."

Snape didn't look so convinced. "An assignment… On what subject?"

"Witch-burnings," Izzy quickly supplied.

"Interesting," the older man said dryly. "Well, I suggest you make it quick. Curfew will be on in less than thirty minutes and believe me when I tell you that you won't want to be walking around these halls then." The tone of his voice was somewhere between the one of a warning and the one of a threat, something that only served to make both of them, as well as Mia, more nervous.

"Don't worry about them, Severus. I will personally escort them to their tower before curfew," Mia assured him from where she stood, promptly turning to the two students. "Girls, if you wouldn't mind," she said, opening her office's door and urging them in.

Both of them gladly excused themselves after that, sparing the headmaster a short look and a mumbled 'good night' before they walked away towards Mia. By the time they stepped into her office and she closed the door, their hearts were already going back to their usual paces.

"What was that all about?" Izzy asked her mother. "Elizabeth went on the run?"

Mia sighed, not quite finding it in her to give her daughter a well-deserved eavesdropping-is-rude lecture. "Yes," she simply responded. "She did."

"Did she tell you she was going to?"

She shook her head. "She only sent me a message afterwards through a friend," Mia said, allowing Izzy to put the pieces together with the presence of Kingsley Shacklebolt at King's Cross a week before. She's wondered what that had been all about. "But don't think it said that much. She just used it to apologize for not saying goodbye and assuring me she was safe. She said she couldn't bear the thought of sending Evie into a school the state Hogwarts is in, even if I was going to be here. Can't really blame her," she added with a sigh. How often she wished she'd done the same with Izzy…

"No, we really can't," her daughter mumbled, occupying a seat by Ginny's side on the sofa her mother kept in the office. "I think she did the right thing."

"_You_ think so?" Mia asked, raising her eyebrows. It just seemed ironic that, after the long campaign she'd put up in order to go back to Hogwarts Izzy would so easily support Elizabeth's decision.

"Well," Izzy replied, easily guessing what her mother was thinking, "there's a big difference between me, a fifteen-year-old girl who knows how to defend herself, putting up with Snape and the Carrows and an eleven-year-old girl who still doesn't quite know how to use a wand doing the same herself."

Mia sighed. "I suppose I should be glad you can at least understand that," she mumbled. "Anyway, we can only hope they won't get any closer to finding her than they are now."

"Doesn't it strike you as odd that Snape was just asking about this now, when school started a week ago?" Ginny couldn't help asking. "Wouldn't it be more effective if he, the Carrows or whoever's in charge of handling this started investigating right when Elizabeth's daughter didn't show up?"

"Well, I imagine they didn't really know she was supposed to start school this year until now. There seemed to be some problems when it came to cross-referencing the students who were supposed to come and the ones that really came."

"How so?" Izzy asked.

Her mother sat down on a chair by her desk. "It's complicated, honey. The records of students' admissions are kept in a magical book that can only really be accessed by the school's rightful headmaster," she explained. "As it turns out, the book doesn't quite recognize Snape as such because he wasn't the deputy headmaster before or named as a successor by Dumbledore."

"Which would make McGonagall the real headmistress," Ginny guessed, receiving a nod in return.

"It took them a few days to figure that out and Minerva stalled some more after they did. After they finally made her give them the records, there was also the fact that, as Snape wasn't recognized as headmaster, the rule saying that Muggle-Borns aren't admitted in the school anymore was basically ignored by the book. I imagine it took him a while to tell Muggle-Borns apart from the rest on that list since it's just a meaningless title in the first place. In any case, this gave the families on the run a considerable head start."

"At least they got that much," Izzy mumbled.

Mia nodded solemnly for a moment. "Well, girls," she said suddenly, "I think it's time I take you up to your dorm. We don't want to get too close to curfew time."

"Wait," Ginny said. "We were hoping… _I_ was hoping you could tell us you have some news about… about Harry." Mia was, after all, their only source of credible news these days when the newspapers were completely under the ministry's thumb.

Her boyfriend's godmother sighed. "I'm afraid I don't have any, Ginny. But you should see that as a good thing," she told her hopefully. She had to believe that herself or else she'd go mad, Mia thought. "It must mean that whatever he's doing, he's doing it well enough not to give himself away."

Ginny pursed her lips together for a moment before nodding, noting that was really the only thing she could really do about that matter. Grin and bear it – the world couldn't know how upset she really was.

"What about Dad?" Izzy asked from where she sat.

Mia looked down sadly for a moment. Merlin, just how badly did she hate being away from Sirius. From her babies. "I talked to him this afternoon. He's still a little… overwhelmed by your brother and sister – looks like he hasn't slept in a week," she said with a pang of guilt in her heart.

Izzy smiled a little, part of her amused upon imagining her father's state. He was always a moody racket when he was sleep-deprived and that was rarely intentional, which only made it more hilarious to see. Of course, her amusement vanished just as soon as the image of her parent's farewell at Platform 9 3/4 crossed her mind… he must be feeling pretty miserable at the moment. "I'm sure he's still pulling it off," she mumbled, for the sake of comforting her mother.

Mia sighed. "I know. But handling children their ages feels like a bit of an impossible task sometimes. He told me Lulu had come by a little while ago to take them for the night, though – I imagine he must be long gone into dreamland by now… He sent his love, by the way," her mother continued. "And asked me to remind you of your agreement," she added, part of her vaguely curious about what such agreement was all about. She'd always noticed how they had those little things – secret agreements, private jokes – that made them closer than she'd ever dared herself to hope back when she was the one handling two kids on her own.

"Right," Izzy mumbled. The one about her trying not to do something terribly stupid while at the school… "Well, tell him to worry about his own side of the agreement because I'm just fine with mine."

Mia sighed. "I'll let him know. Well, shall we get your dorm now or not?"

Izzy nodded, getting up as Ginny did the same. "Let's," the brunette said. "Last thing I'd want is running into a Dementor on our way there."

* * *

That had, to put it simple, been the busiest week of his life. Not theworst – even though at times he'd thought it had been pretty close, Sirius admitted – but no doubt the busiest.

He'd known, of course, ever since he and Mia had decided she needed to go back to Hogwarts in order to keep an eye on Izzy that his job of handling the two little ones back home would be demanding. Logically speaking, by acting as a single parent he'd have twice the work when it came to parenting than when Mia was around. Oh, he'd been wrong… so very wrong.

He wasn't sure how… he wasn't even sure why but somehow those kids – his so-adored little kids – managed to make him feel like he was caring for at least a dozen of them. There was feeding, changing, bathing, dressing, playing, drawing, chasing… and that was, of course, leaving out the endless wailing fits Mary had grown so fond of lately and Alex's newly-restored fits of over-activeness. And when two or more of those overlapped… oh, it was a hair-pulling, teeth-clenching, gut-wrenching nightmare. It was during those times that he'd find himself wondering what the hell he'd been thinking every time he'd bugged Mia about having more kids in a possible post-war universe… Often he'd even consider taking a trip to St. Mungo's, either it was to get himself fixed or to check himself into the mental ward.

He loved those kids to death but, Merlin's pants, they'd be the death of him.

Ironically enough, though, it was all that insanity that kept him sane through Mia's absence because, without her around, the kids were really all he had to focus on. They were all he had to occasionally make him smile and all he had to make Mia smile over. There was always a funny story or an interesting situation to share with her during their daily two-way mirror conversations, either it was Mary finally mastering her crawling or Alex drawing all over his sister when Sirius had turned his back from them for a minute or two. He supposed he should count himself lucky for that, at least.

Still, being thankful didn't keep him from rejoicing when, the previous afternoon, his mother-in-law had shown up announcing her intentions to kidnap his kids for the rest of the day and keep them through the night. He'd slept for no less than eighteen hours straight then – roughly as much as he'd slept in total through the six other days of that week – and would've done so longer if a certain annoying little creature hadn't kept him from achieving that.

"Master," the squeaky little voice said, shaking him awake.

"Gway," Sirius mumbled against his pillow.

The lack of clarity of his sleep-filled voice allowed Kreacher to ignore him, instead continuing with the shaking. "Master need to wake up now!" he insisted.

Sirius nearly growled. "No, what 'Master' needs to do is to kill you and thrown you at the bottom of the Thames," he stated, removing his head from the pillow for a moment just so he could glare at the house-elf.

"No, you need to get your arse out of that bed and get dressed because it's already past eleven in the bloody morning!" he heard a familiar voice – certainly _not _Kreacher's – commanding.

He turned around to face the person in question and frowned. "Tonks? What the…?" Where had she come from? And why was she there, standing in his bedroom in the middle of the day?

His younger cousin rolled her eyes. "Hurry up, will you? This is important!"

"What's…?" he paused. "Is it Moony? Is he…?"

"What? No! He's fine and probably on his way since I've just sent him a patronus."

"Then wha…"

She sighed. "It's Harry. Now get dressed – I'll be waiting downstairs." And, with that, she walked out of his room, followed by a rather concerned-looking Kreacher.

In his stead, though, Sirius just stood there for what had to be a full minute. Harry? She was there about Harry? he questioned himself several times, having trouble jumping to the part when he started asking himself about why. When he did manage to get there, quickly realizing there was little to no chance she was bringing good news, something snapped in him and he got to work. He wasn't quite sure what the world record for the least time spent getting dressed was but later he'd wonder if his achievement right then and there didn't make him a contender for it. Either way, in the midst of all the hurry he certainly hadn't noticed the fact that he was wearing mismatched socks and a shirt that was far too light for the current weather. He didn't care – all he did care about was reaching downstairs and finding out what on earth his cousin had meant by '_It's Harry'_.

He found her pacing in the drawing room as Kreacher sat nearby, furiously polishing a silver candlestick. He vaguely noticed her hair was longer than usual that day, bright auburn and arranged in a messy ponytail. When she did notice him there, she raised her eyebrows.

"Well, I see you woke up fast after…"

"Please don't tell me he's been caught," he interrupted her. "I beg you. Please don't tell me that."

Tonks let out a breath. "Look as far as I know, he hasn't been caught. And I'm not just saying it just because you're asking me to. It's, well, it's sort of complicated but I'm pretty sure I'd have heard by now if he'd been apprehended."

"Then what the hell is going on?"

The metamorphagus walked over to the couch and took a seat on its arm. "Okay, before I tell you anything, I just need to point out that I didn't actually _see _what happened so this is mostly hearsay and there may or may not be a detail or two that's not actually accurate…"

"Okay, okay, just get to the point will you?" Sirius told her.

She huffed. "Fine. So… er, it appears Harry may have been to the ministry this morning."

Sirius looked at her in disbelief. "What do you mean by _'may have been to the ministry'_?"

Tonks scratched her chin for a moment. "I mean… er… look, it's hard to explain, so let me start from the beginning: someone impersonated three ministry officials this morning and managed to get themselves into a Muggle-Born trial. There, let's just say they caused a whole lot of havoc, attacked Umbridge in the process and made a run for it. As I said, I wasn't actually there but a few people at the ministry's employee entryway saw them right before disapparating and most of them said… most of them said that Runcorn's face – that's one of the blokes who was impersonated, real bastard, by the way – shifted into Harry's right before they vanished. You know what that could mean…"

"Polyjuice fading away," Sirius mumbled, receiving a nod in return. "You think it was really him?"

She let out a long breath. "I can't say for sure. I mean, it could be just hysteria with them imagining it – Merlin knows I've heard my share of rubbish from witnesses – but there were nearly a dozen of them swearing it, which makes it very unlikely… And that kind of statement – Harry Potter walking into the ministry – well, let's just say that's not something you'd want to spill out without being really sure these days… The ministry was already denying it by the time I left to come here but my guess is that it's just wounded pride – it's pretty embarrassing having Harry fooling them all so easily. I'd say it might actually be him."

"Merlin," Sirius mumbled as he started pacing around. "But why the hell would he do that? What was he thinking? What could possibly be worth the risk they just took? I mean, you said they attacked Umbridge but I just can't picture them infiltrating the bloody ministry only for the sake of roughing her up… she's just not worth it."

"Well, if that was their purpose, I wouldn't say they'd done a really good job," Tonks observed. "I mean, they basically just stunned her – I could name you in the next ten minutes a hundred much-better ways for them to kick her bitchy little arse."

"Phew… I could come up with twice that myself in half the time," Sirius replied easily. "So, okay, they probably didn't go there just to lay it on Umbridge. But they had to have some purpose. I mean, Harry's not so brainless or so pompous that he'd even consider infiltrating the ministry just for the hell of it. He's definitely not that reckless." Harry was, thank Merlin, not like him, Sirius considered. And the only things valuable enough that he could picture Harry breaking into the ministry for were clear in his mind: a friend in need or a Horcrux. Somehow, he was leaning towards the second that time, not having heard of any friend of him mysteriously goinf missing aside from Muggle-borns that had gone on the run…

"Well, I guess you'll have to ask Harry about it next time you see him," Tonks said dryly.

"Yeah, well, I doubt that will happen anytime soon," Sirius mumbled. "So, they got in and out fine, right? That's what matters."

"Er…" the metamorphagus mumbled hesitantly. "About the way out… so, apparently Yaxley – you know Yaxley, big bad Death Eater – grabbed a hold of one of them just as they were apparating."

"What? And you're just saying that now?" Sirius shouted in disbelief as Kreacher let out a little panicked squeak from where he sat, promptly dropping the candlestick he was polishing.

"Well, there was no point in getting you to freak out earlier. I mean, we haven't the palest idea of where they went, so even if we wanted to help them, we wouldn't be able to. Besides, if Yaxley had caught them, I'm sure we'd know by now. It took me close to an hour to manage to get out of the ministry with all the mess going on in there and still there were no news of him. Do you have any idea how badly those Death Eaters want to get into You-Know-Who's good graces? Pretty badly, let me tell you. Yaxley wouldn't have waited a second before bringing him in."

"So, what are we just supposed to do? Wait and hope?"

"I guess. Look, I know it doesn't feel right but there's really nothing else…"

Kreacher let out another strangled squeak, that one catching their attention as it was much louder than before.

"For Merlin's sake, what's wrong with you?" Sirius asked the house-elf in an annoyed tone.

He didn't respond, though, instead just looking very oddly at him and then at Tonks. His lips seemed to be attempting to move but he was clearly not succeeding at it.

"Oh, great," Sirius muttered dryly. "Lovely time for him to lose his marbles for good…"

"No," Tonks mumbled, standing up from her sitting position and approaching Kreacher, kneeling in front of the chair he was occupying. "He wants to say something. Don't you?"

Kreacher seemed quite unable to say anything, his eyes on Sirius as if he was expecting something from him.

"Well, what is it, then?" his master asked, approaching.

"K… Kreacher… Kreacher can't…"

"You've been ordered not to tell something, haven't you?" Tonks asked before turning to Sirius. "I've seen this happen before to house-elves I had to question. Means their masters ordered them to keep something a secret."

"Their masters? I'm his master!" Sirius pointed out.

"Not the only one," Tonks replied. "Mia, Izzy… Harry. They're your family, therefore their orders to Kreacher are also binding. Not as binding as yours, though."

"So what? I just order him to spill it and he will?" Sirius asked, glancing at Kreacher, who gave him a look that made it seem like he was asking – begging – him to do so. The little bastard actually wanted to share whatever he was holding on to. "Well, then? Spill it, Kreacher."

The house-elf let out a breath of relief before speaking. "Kreach…"

The sudden sound of the doorbell ringing interrupted the old elf's words and made Sirius swear under his breath.

"Oh, come on! Now?" he complained

"That's probably Remus," the metamorphagus announced as she motioned to stand up. "I'll let him in for you. Just go on, the two of you – don't let us keep you. I'll be right back." And, with that, she walked out of the room, yelling at the visitor to 'keep his trousers on' when they rang a second time.

"Well, you were saying…" Sirius told the house-elf, sitting down on the sofa right by his chair just as he found himself alone with him in the room.

"Kreacher been helping Young Master Harry," Kreacher stated in a mere whisper that seemed to stun his master.

"What? How?"

"Young Master call for Kreacher's help the week after he leave. Kreacher been looking after him and friends ever since."

So that was where he'd been disappearing to all those times, it occurred to Sirius. Sneaky little bastard. "And how… how has he been?" he couldn't help asking.

Kreacher hesitated before responding, as if he didn't quite know what to put things at first. "Young Master been busy. He miss family," he added. "He take some time to get used to being away from home. Ask about Masters every time he see Kreacher."

"Right… and what he exactly did he need your help for?"

"Young Master worried that dirty thief Mundungus Fletched would never be found. He want Kreacher to help so he could get bad locket Master Regulus took," Kreacher explained.

"And did you?"

He nodded. "Kreacher found him in dirty little hole in Leeds and brought him to Young Master. Thief confess he stole the locket but said he sell it. To bad woman in the Ministry – the one that sack Masters from Hogwarts when Young Master Alex was still a baby."

And so the puzzle started to make sense. "Umbridge. They went to the ministry to steal the locket back from her."

He received a nod in return. "Kreacher didn't like plan – offer to steal it himself. Young Master say 'no' – he say it be too dangerous," the house-elf promptly stated, looking rather disappointed that he'd had no choice but obeying. "Kreacher worried about him and friends now."

"They're probably fine," Sirius mumbled even though he wasn't fully sure of that himself. Why the hell was he bothering to comfort Kreacher or all people… er, house-elves? he wondered as he heard Tonks making her way back with Remus in a tow…

"… _perfectly understandable why I'd think this was about the baby. You sent me a Patronus calling me here for 'an emergency'! What was I supposed to think?"_ Remus was saying as he followed his wife into the room.

"I don't _know_. All I know is that these days I can't sneeze without you wanting to haul me all the way to St. Mungo's. You'd think I was terminally ill instead of pregnant."

"I'm just looking out for you, Dora. I mean, you have a history of… well…" he said, hesitating right there at the end, recalling that mentioning his wife's proneness to being clumsy might not be a good idea at the moment.

"A history of what exactly?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.

Sirius cleared his throat from where he sat, rescuing their attention from the impending fight. "Guess who's been in contact with a certain godson of mine for the past few weeks," he said, nodding at Kreacher.

"Harry? Is all this about Harry?" Remus asked, looking at Tonks rather confused.

"Shush," his wife said, elbowing him. "I'll explain later – in the meantime try to catch up on the conversation," she told him before looking at Kreacher. "Do you know where Harry's hiding? Because he might need our help. You know you can trust us."

The house-elf hesitated for a mere second, looking between Sirius, Tonks and Remus before nodding. "Kreacher does. But Young Master tell Kreacher not to tell anyone."

"Oh, come on," Sirius said, frustrated. "You wouldn't have made that whole squeaking act so I'd order you to spill it if you were so set on following exactly what Harry told you to do. Besides, I can only see one of two things happening here: either they do need our help and will be thankful when we show up regardless of what orders you broke or they actually don't need our help and, odds are, they're about to move from wherever they are now, given Yaxley has followed them there. The last thing I'd want to know would be something that could hurt Harry if, Merlin forbid, Death Eaters could get it out of me. _Unless,_" he added, "I really thought he needed me to. I may be a crappy master but I sure as hell like to believe I'm not a crappy father or godfather," he said very calmly.

Kreacher looked at him rather oddly. Of course he would never, ever grace Sirius with saying that out loud but these days he didn't quite see him as a bad master. He wasn't a great one either like Mistress Mia, the Young Masters or Master Regulus but Kreacher had found himself growing to respect him, if not as anything else, as an opponent of sorts – the world wouldn't be right if they were nice to each other, Kreacher firmly believed. But still, he had to admit Master Sirius was ten times the master his father had been before him. Ten times the master and a hundred times the father, he admitted. "Young Master hiding in parents' old home."

"You mean Lily and James's old place here in London?" Remus asked, receiving a nod in return before he turned to his wife and his best friend. "That wouldn't have been a bad choice. It's where the Order used to meet – Dumbledore set up wards worthy of fortress-status."

"You mean aside from all of us, Snape included, being secret-keepers to it since he died?" Sirius observed.

"Yes but, as far as Snape knows, the place is abandoned," Tonks stated. "Besides, Mad-Eye told me long before he… you know… he told me he'd set up a number of enchantments over there just in case. Not sure what he meant by that but I'm positive he'd have made sure Snape would stay out."

Sirius couldn't help thinking that made some sense. "Well, regardless of it being a good choice for a hiding place or not, I guess we should get going now. We've wasted enough time. As for you," he added, looking at Kreacher. "Go to Lulu's and tell her to keep Alex and Mary a little longer because I'm not sure how long this will take. And then, _stay there _until I call you back, you hear me?"

From where he stood, Kreacher scowled but, unable to question the order, disappeared from the room with a light 'pop'.

"Someone didn't look too happy he didn't get to join us," Tonks observed.

Sirius huffed as he started walking over to the door. "Did you actually expect me to go on a potential rescue mission with an old grouchy house-elf in a tow?"

The metamorphagus chuckled as she followed him, hitting her husband's arm lightly. "Aw, look at that, Remus. He's actually starting to care about Kreacher's well-being," she told him cutely, for Sirius's frustration.

"Am not! Shut up," he muttered. "He'd just… he'd just get on the way!"

"Get on the way… excuses," she replied, rolling her eyes before hitting her husband's arm once again. "Tell him, Remus."

The former teacher let out a long huffing breath. Sometimes it was like having two bickering children when his wife and best friend got together – he supposed, in a way, that might be a good way to ease him into parenthood… "Can we please focus on the task here, please?" he requested.

"Yes, let's focus on the task, thank you very much, Moony," Sirius gladly replied, shooting Tonks a narrow-eyed glare.

It didn't take them any more than five minutes to reach the Covent Garden georgian neighbourhood Lily and James Potter had lived in before their exile to Godric's Hollow. Looking at the building they had once called a home brought back many memories of happier times, as it always did… however the time for reminiscing was not the current, Sirius recognized as he led the way up to the porch, already covered by the house's wards. No sound came from the inside of the house but, then again, the wards had been designed to guarantee so – either there was a battle or absolute silence inside, no one could tell without going in.

Reaching for his wand, he tapped it on the lock once to gain entrance. For a short moment he wondered if the wards would still let him in but then the sound of a click rendered his doubts useless. When he tried to push the door open, though, he found it quite hard to move.

"Need a hand, Padfoot?" Remus asked him as he saw his friend struggling.

Sirius didn't refuse it. "I think there's something blocking the door on the other side," he mumbled.

"Blocking the door?" Tonks inquired in confusion as her husband joined Sirius in trying to push the door open. "There are far more effective ways to keep a door closed…"

"Well, there's definitely something blocking this one," Remus mumbled as he and Sirius combined efforts in pushing the door, eventually getting it open a few inches but finding it hard to do much more. No sound whatsoever came through the open door.

"Hang on," Tonks said, moving towards the door. "I'll go in and move whatever's on the other side – it must be in some weird position or something…"

Remus cleared his throat as his wife tried to squeeze through the narrow opening. "Dora, I don't think…"

"Oh, shush, will you?" she replied rolling her eyes just a moment before realizing she actually couldn't pass through. _Oh, come on… _she thought. "Alright, maybe another push wouldn't hurt," she mumbled in frustration, realizing she wasn't so skinny anymore. The kid wasn't born yet and it was already putting her in awkward situations… a promising start for baby Lupin, no doubt.

"_Maybe_," Remus replied, a look that clearly said 'I told you so' on his face.

The metamorphagus glared as she stepped away from the door. "Hey, don't you give me that look! This is _your_ fault, in case you'd forgotten," she stated.

"It always is," Sirius mumbled to his friend. "Especially when their back hurts or when they can't get up or when they're giving birth… I'd start reviewing my shied charms now if I were you."

"Oh, go on and you might need to use one just now, Sirius," Tonks promised.

Remus cleared his throat. "Let's just…" he mumbled, nodding at the door.

Another session of pushing the door, granted them a few more inches, that time enough for the metamorphagus to pass and clear the way. As soon as she got in, though, they heard her yelp.

When Sirius's eyes met Remus's, he knew they had both simultaneously entered panic-mode. "Dora? What's going on? Dora?"

"… _didn't kill you!"_ they heard her saying from the inside. "_Okay, okay… seems like it was just one of Mad-Eye's charms. I'm fine aside from a quasi-heart attack. Merlin, even dead the bloke still scares the living daylights out of…Well, hello, Yaxley," _her voice suddenly said, as if she'd just spotted him.

A second moment of panic hit them both on the outside. "Dora, get out of the way. We're blowing up this door!" Remus yelled.

"_No, don't! He's knocked out cold_," she declared to their relief. "_Seems alive, though. Let me just levitate him somewhere else and get this junk out of the way_."

As they anxiously stood outside for what seemed like endless minutes, they heard the sound of steps and heavy furniture being moved around inside the house until Tonks finally opened the door, allowing them both in. And, just as they did, they spotted Yaxley's unconscious form laying discarded on the floor a few feet away.

"Well, looks like they handled this well enough," Sirius thought.

"It doesn't seem like there was a big struggle or there would be more broken things," Tonks stated, "My guess is they apparated with him and blasted him away, taking some furniture on the way and knocking him out."

Remus nodded as his eyes remained suspiciously on the unconscious Death Eater. "I take it Harry must be gone by now. The house seems empty, although I guess we should do a search just in case. Padfoot, you want to take the upper floors…?"

Sirius shook his head. "Nah, you two go on. I'll look down here and keep an eye on this one," he stated, nodding at Yaxley. "In case he decides to grace us with presence of mind."

"Oh, I hit him with a stunner right when I saw him," Tonks pointed out. "He was out already but I figured it wouldn't hurt."

He nodded from where he stood, promptly watching as the two walked off to the nearest staircase, already bickering over the fact that Tonks insisted they should split for the search, while Remus replied that they should stay together supposedly for the sole reason that he knew the house better than her, which she didn't seem to buy.

By the time their voices faded away, Sirius had already placed yet another spell on Yaxley, that one consisting of a full-body bind, and had moved down to the Lower Ground Floor to sweep it first. He found nothing of major importance neither in the kitchen nor in the large sitting room just outside of it that the Order used to occupy for their meetings. That was enough to convince him to move back to the ground floor, where he found Yaxley still knocked out and bound.

Moving on to the reception room, he found three makeshift beds made up near the sitting area, which led him to believe Harry, Ron and Hermione must've been sleeping over there. There were clear signs of their daily routines around but personal items were close to none – they probably kept those permanently packed just in case.

What caught his eye, though, was the small pile of old items laying discarded near one of the beds. Things Harry likely had found around the house… mementos of his parents' lives: an old Gryffindor Quidditch Team Captain badge that had once belonged to James, a jewelled little hair ornament he recalled seeing Lily wear sometimes, an old photo-album going back to a few years before Harry had even been born.

He couldn't help smiling at the specific page the album was opened on as he picked it up – a photo of his eighteen-year-old self with a younger Mia right next to James and Lily during a dinner party meant to celebrate Judy Potter's birthday. Merlin, it seemed like a lifetime ago, he thought… he and Mia had moved in together just months before and Lily and James weren't even engaged yet. It was a simpler time back then. Turning the page, he had to chuckle at the number forty on the birthday cake – a private joke of him and James. Judy Potter's fortieth birthday might have been long past by then but they constantly swore to her – especially when they were trying to suck up – she'd started aging backwards from the moment she'd turned fifty, which, by that logic, would have put her back at forty that very birthday. Merlin, he missed her – he missed them all.

Sounds of footsteps came from the stairway, followed by his friends' voices.

"We found nothing upstairs," Tonks announced loudly, appearing behind Sirius as he turned, followed by her husband. "Well, other than that the place is much bigger than I thought."

"Lily and James were planning to raise a big family here," Remus said a bit sadly. "Never really got the chance…"

His wife pursed her lips together for a moment, clearly distraught at the thought. "Well, I'm sure one day Harry will put this place up to good use with his own family."

No one really added anything to that. It was nice thinking – believing – in a better future, even picturing it, but that was something so… distant at the moment that they couldn't really allow themselves to explore it further at the fear of everything ending up horribly wrong.

"We need to figure out what to do with sleepy pants over there," Sirius declared, nodding at the unconscious Death Eater behind the pair.

They turned around too, looking at him. "What do you suggest?" Remus asked, having no clue of what to do with him.

"Well, we can't just release him back on the streets," Sirius pointed out. "That's a nasty creep and there are more than enough of those out there these days." There was only one place where he belonged and that was, without a doubt, Azkaban – unfortunately, that wasn't an option since the prison just happened to be under _their _sides' control.

"What, then?" the werewolf questioned. "We hold him hostage for Merlin-knows-how-long? Unless…" his face turned grim. "You couldn't be suggesting…"

"Of course I'm not!" Sirius immediately said. "We're not like them. Maybe he deserves worse than being killed but I'm not going to be the one tainting my hands with the blood of an unarmed man. Not sure where we could stock him away from the streets, though…"

"Well, maybe you won't have to," Tonks said. "I know this one spell… it's hard to explain how it works – I guess you could call it a long-term, pretty powerful confounding hex. But, anyway, let's just say it will probably render him out of commission for a while, enough that, even if he was out there, he'd be completely useless."

"A while?" Sirius asked suspiciously.

"Somewhere between eight months and a year," she specified. "Depends on a lot of things. I've heard of cases it lasted more than eighteen months."

"And when you say out of commission…" Remus mumbled.

"I mean padded-room-in-St. Mungo's out of commission," she specified.

Sirius gulped. "Well…"

"Where on Earth would you learn a spell like that?" her husband found himself unable not to ask.

She blushed, something she rarely did. "Look, Mad-Eye firmly believed that sometimes when the law can't do its job, it's up to us to handle the justice part of the picture. He taught me some stuff just in case…. Listen, if you'd rather we find another way to deal with that slime, I'm open to suggestions but it's not like this spell will actually physically hurt him or make him permanently loopy, not that he even deserves that courtesy…"

Sirius nodded. "Well, in my opinion, if anything, this sounds like quite a merciful solution for him, which is far more than he deserves even though it would solve our problem," he stated before turning to Remus. "What's your say in this Moony?"

The werewolf looked thoughtful for a few moments before saying anything. He seemed to be organizing the pros and cons in his mind. "Fair enough," he ended up saying. "I'm sure he's done much worse to others in his run as a Death Eater than that spell ever will."

"So, what, Tonks here does her massive confounding thing and then what? We can't just leave him in this place," Sirius pointed out.

The metamorphagus shrugged. "We could take his wand and dump him in a park or something. Even if Muggles find him, I'm sure they'll take him to a nice little loony bin."

Remus and Sirius looked at each other for a moment before shrugging too. "Sounds like a plan," the latter agreed. "Okay, you do your thing, Tonks. And don't forget to obliviate him in case he gets his marbles back too soon somehow."

She gave them a short nod before approaching Yaxley and getting to work. The spell itself seemed quite complicated, requiring a long enchantment and very specific wand movements. In the end, a blue light shot from the end of Tonks' wand, shining through the Death Eater's head as if it was empty. When they woke him up for a few seconds in order to make sure everything was in order, they got a very unusual rant about random things like cauldron cakes, pink hippogriffs and love potions – yep, Sirius thought, whoever ended up finding that one would have a field day, either Muggle or Magical.

"Well, there goes my fun for now," Tonks announced, putting her wand as well as Yaxley's away in her pocket after having stunned him again. "Here I was hoping to get a fight out of this to keep me in shape now that I've quit."

Remus turned his face to her suddenly. "You quit?"

"Don't look so surprised – you've been yakking for weeks about how dangerous it was for me to work at the ministry and, to be honest, there was nothing there to make me stay since I've been anything but an auror since You-Know-Who took over. I was just waiting for a sign to come and I guess what happened today was enough. Besides, soon enough it will get far too hard to hide the fact that I'm pregnant and I don't want that reaching the wrong ears."

"What will you do now?" Sirius asked.

She shrugged. "Dunno. Maybe I'll help with the Order for now – I've been in contact with Kingsley and he has some plans to get Muggle-borns out of the country. After that, I guess I'll hang out at the joke shop a lot. Also keep my mum some company while Dad is away on the run – maybe I'll even let her teach me how to knit." She groaned. "Merlin, I feel bored already."

"There, there," her husband said, patting her shoulder. "You'll be fine."

"Hey, if you want to get busy, I've got two little monsters at home who just love to make me want to pull my own hair, one of whom just happens to be your only godchild. I'd be more than happy to share them," Sirius offered.

She chuckled. "I might actually take you up on that one."

"Please do," he said, already pulling up his sleeves as he eyed the unconscious Yaxley.

"Well, so I guess we're done here," Remus mumbled, looking at the unconscious Death eater on the floor.

"Yep," Sirius agreed. "Time to take the trash out, then."

**A/N: Well, I hope you liked it. I needed to incorporate a lot of plot elements in this one so I can get to a little time jump soon. Hope it didn't feel too rushed. Well, feedback is always welcome - review!**

**Anne**


	53. Reaction

**A/N: I am so incredibly sorry for the delay on the chapter and the review replies... I am under a gigantic amount of pressure these days with a million group assignments, tests, work, family and, well, real life in general. I wish i could just turn on the pause button. Finally I managed to finish the chapter but it didn't quite turn out the way I wanted it to... *sigh* I suppose we can't always be happy and I hope you appreciate this one anyway... Happy valentine's day, BTW.**

**Note: This chapter includes a couple of sentences borrowed from "The tales of beedle the bard"**

**London, 31 October 1997**

As he read the third story in a row, Sirius groaned, finding himself looking into persistently open, yet sleepy grey eyes upon glancing over the book.

Merlin's pants, couldn't the kid throw him a bone?

One would think that, after two months watching the kids on his own, he'd have already tackled the whole nap-time debacle with his son: Alex had apparently gotten it into his head that he was far too big a boy to have to waste his precious time napping instead of wreaking some havoc. Sure, more often than not his son's body would betray his mind on that matter, leading him to eventually fall into a deep stupor… but, of course, said betrayal would take hours to come sometimes.

He sighed as he kept on reading, flipping the page carefully so he wouldn't disturb Mary, who lay very much asleep cuddled on his lap – that one, surprisingly, didn't lift much of a problem around nap-time. Her specialty was nights, of course, because his kids simply couldn't agree on when it was best to drive Daddy mad…

It was about ten minutes later, as he read in a tone that was so deadpan he was actually close to falling asleep on his own, that he found himself just about to face victory in the form of drooping eyes on his son's face. _See? You can't beat Sirius Black, you little bas… er, you little basket of joy,_ he thought just as he adjusted Mary in his arms, getting ready to read the last sentence, close the book and go put his daughter in her cot. Fate, however, seemed to have other plans.

"Ah, finally I run into someone in this house! I was starting to think the place was deserted," he suddenly heard a voice saying behind him before turning around and seeing Tonks standing at the doorway.

He took a breath, then another, slowly narrowing his eyes at her.

"_Daddy, I want the stowy_," Alex complained from the bed, having slipped out of the drowsy state he'd been on just seconds earlier.

Sirius grunted, shooting his cousin a look that could kill, to which she responded with a pair of raised eyebrows, that day matching her hair in its usual bubble-gum pink hue. He'd been _so_ close. "Just a minute, mate. Daddy needs to go say 'hi' to Auntie Tonks," he told his son, who complained some more before quickly trading the groaning for giggling as Tonks started making faces at him from the doorway.

As the little boy relished on his amusement, Sirius got up, Mary whimpering a little but not quite waking up as he shifted her on his arms. "You know, if you weren't pregnant, married to my best mate and one of the very few members of the Black Family tree that I don't hate, I might just curse you where you stood."

"Merlin, aren't you in a brilliant mood today?" she replied sarcastically, crossing her arms over her largely expanded belly, now barely disguised by the loose clothes she wore.

"Do you have any idea how close I was to getting that little rug-rat to sleep when you showed up? And, trust me, that's not an easy thing to achieve around nap-time."

"Well, I guess that's going to be _my_ problem now since you're needed elsewhere, making me the one who'll be putting the rug-rat in question to sleep," she pointed out, tipping her head to the left so she could make yet another face at Alex, who giggled some more.

"Elsewhere?" he asked, raising an eyebrow as Mary drooled all over his shirt.

She nodded. "Yep. Your presence is requested at the joke shop. Remus and the twins need you to drop by to discuss a little project of theirs and to help them out with things that are apparently 'far too stressful for a woman in my condition to be handling'. But that's fine," she added, making herself smile in a slightly wicked manner. "That's fine because those idiots will come crawling back when they realize I'm the only one who actually knows how to put all that wireless crap together." All thanks to Mad Eye, the old paranoid bastard, who'd thought she needed to know how to set up and operate every means of communication known to man… "Joke's on them."

"Wait, back up a little… _wireless crap_? What are on abo…?"

"I guess you'll just have to see for yourself when you join the big guys club meeting," she replied dryly. "Just go put your daughter down and change that shirt, will you? You're covered in drool," she told him, making a face.

"Well, why would that be?" he asked, pretending to be thinking hard. "Oh, yes, it's because I had an infant sleeping on me for almost an hour while I tried to put her brother to sleep just to have my efforts crushed by _someone _barging in just as I was _this close_ to succeeding," he said, holding his thumb and index finger as close as they could possibly be without touching.

She rolled her eyes before snatching the storybook he didn't realize he was still holding from his hands and giving him a daring look. "Bet I'll wear him out in less than fifteen minutes."

He snorted. "Oh… the innocence. I'm going to have so much fun watching you crack once that kid of yours is born."

"Fifteen minutes," she promised before turning on her heel, headed into the room.

"Oh, and by the way," he added, really wanting to piss her off since she'd basically ruled almost an hour of effort useless. "You're _huge,_" he told her even though she wasn't _that _big yet.

He half-expected that the only thing keeping her from cursing him or maybe performing some sort of tackling move on him in a rage was the fact that he was currently holding her only godchild. Boy, he was wrong. And not in the way he'd expect… because, instead of showing any sign of anger, she actually grinned before rubbing her baby bump. "I know. I can't fit my own clothes anymore. Isn't it great?" And, with that, she walked into Alex's room. "_Alright, big guy, brace yourself because auntie Tonks is knocking you out."_

He groaned. _Damn her, _he thought as he walked away, his ten-month-old daughter's breath tickling his neck. Just when a bloke wanted to piss off a pregnant woman – probably one of the easiest things to achieve in the world – she had to go and act all cheerful about her size… Not natural. It was simply not natural…

He put Mary down inside her cot without much of a fuss from the little girl before making his way into his room to change. When he caught a glimpse of himself on the full-sized mirror by the wardrobe, he groaned.

Daddy Sirius looked pretty pitiful these days, he thought. His hair was too long, he desperately needed to shave and his shirt… well, his shirt not only was covered in drool, as Tonks had indicated, but also somehow presented a food stain with the shape of a small hand on the back of it.

He sighed. He adored his kids… he really did. But he couldn't help growing a little frustrated with the way things were going for him. Back when Voldemort and his pals had taken over, he'd pictured himself in weekly battles wiping the floor with some Death Eater arse, not deep into daddy-duty, changing diapers, giving bottles and reading bedtime stories eighteen out of twenty-four hours a day…

As much as he knew he was doing the right thing, as much as being busy with the little ones was the only thing ironically keeping him sane while knowing Izzy and Mia were miles away practically cohabitating with some of the nastiest Death Eaters he'd ever heard of, part of him couldn't help growing frustrated that he was over there babysitting while Death Eaters were ruling the bloody country with just a trio of teenagers actually trying to do anything about it… He was Sirius bloody Black – he was supposed to be doing something about it. He _wanted _to be doing something about it. Merlin, he'd give a small fortune to get rid of the kids for a while and just go out to kick some ar…

He paused, frowning at his reflection on the mirror. What on Earth was he thinking?

Yes, he might feel the need to be doing something. He might believe he'd lose it if he didn't. But he needed to be smart about it. And he most certainly needed to remember his primary job at the moment, which was keeping the little ones safe while Mia did the same with Izzy at Hogwarts. Going out and just 'kicking some arse' with no planning whatsoever certainly didn't sound the smartest way to juggle his job with his needs… He needed to stop thinking like a bloody teenager, Sirius thought as he walked over to the bathroom and turned on the water for a quick shower.

When he exited his room, showered, dressed and shaven, guilt over his earlier thoughts led him to check on Mary again, only to see she was still quite peacefully asleep in her cot. Alex's room followed and, even before he stepped him, he could hear his cousin still reading out loud. He couldn't help grinning a little at that – so, Tonksy thought she could just get a toddler to sleep so eas…

_Damn her, _he thought again all of a sudden as he peaked into the room and found the little boy very much asleep on his bed as the Metamorphagus still read out loud. How the hell had she done it so bloody quickly? Little traitor, he thought, eyeing his son. The kid just had to fall asleep when he wanted him to stay awake and stay awake when he wanted him to sleep. Was that opposite day? Because it felt like opposite day.

"… _most dreadful sight awaited them there," _Tonks read, raising an eyebrow at the book she was reading from – not the one he'd handed to her but another from a pile she'd apparently stocked by the side of his son's bed – without noticing him at the door._ "The maiden lay dead on the floor, her breas…_ Merlin's pants, what the hell kind of storybook is this one?" she said, flipping the pages flipping the pages further. "…_slit the oldest brother's throat_…?… _driven mad with hopeless longing, killed himself_…? Bloody hell. I don't know about you, little Lupin, but this kind of gory thing disguised as a kid's book isn't coming anywhere near your ears after today. I don't want your first word to be death or anything – things are depressing enough as it is. Maybe I should just stick with Muggle tales like Mum and Dad did…" she declared, addressing her unborn child as she closed the book, put it down and reached to tuck the covers tighter around her husband's godson. Tonks looked so much at ease he couldn't help himself from at least partially forgiving her earlier gaffe of interrupting his efforts to put Alex to sleep.

She would, Sirius thought before clearing his throat to get her attention, be a good mum.

"Ah, there you are," she whispered as she turned around with a victorious grin. "I think I had something to tell you… what was it, really…? Ah, I remember now. Eat that up," she said, pointing at the sleeping child as she sat back down on the rocking chair by the bed. "Twelve minutes and forty-eight seconds. I timed it."

"Don't look so smug. He was already half asleep when you stepped in. Thanks to me, by the way," he said in an awkwardly low frustrated tone.

"Yeah, yeah, your son's asleep and I was the one here when it happened. That's the point. Now get lost – I'm too busy picking bedtime stories for mine to put up with you further," she said in a careless manner, rolling her eyes at him as she picked up another book from the pile.

Sirius raised an eyebrow at her words. "Wait a minute – picking bedtime stories for 'yours'? As in your _son? _Does that mean it's a b…?"

She gave him a look that said it all. "Not a word, Sirius. Remus wants to be surprised," she informed him, her lips curling slightly as she said it before looking back down at the book. "Now shoo – I'm having a moment with my kid here."

"Hey, this is my house!" he complained, still keeping his tone low. "And, for the record, you'd better be planning to sneak the name 'Sirius' somewhere into that baby's birth certificate or else I'm never speaking to you again," he let her know.

"Well, it was nice meeting you, then," she replied, not looking up at him.

"Very funny, Nymphadora," he said dryly.

That one seemed to do the trick. She looked up at him with wild, murderous eyes, making him grin in return before she even uttered the words. "_Don't call me_…" she started saying loudly before Alex shifted on the bed, making her suddenly pause and lower her voice. "Don't call me by that name," she whispered furiously.

He chuckled for a moment before heading out the door and down the stairs. There was a dreadful day waiting outside when he stepped out of the house but he just witnessed it for a moment before apparating into Diagon Alley, right in front of the shop. That sight, he thought, was worse than the day's weather.

If it was possible for a place to hit rock-bottom, he imagined that would be the sight of it. It looked like where happiness came to die – and he didn't use that expression lightly. In fact, he'd only applied it to Azkaban in the past. Never before in his life had he counted so little people in Diagon Alley. Five, as far as he could see, to be specific, three of which he identified as Snatchers. And, as for shops, well, from the look of it he could safely say he was about to walk into the only one that was open in a fifty yard radius.

The light and colour of the shop contrasting with the severe environment outside were a sight for sore eyes, still they didn't seem to be able to attract more than half a dozen lonely costumers that day.

"Is it me or it keeps getting more and more depressing out there?" he asked the half of the Weasley-twin team standing at the counter, apparently entertaining himself by doing the always-hilarious crosswords on The Quibbler.

Fred – George, maybe – looked up at him, not very surprised to see him, and frowned. "What? That? Depressing? Phew… You're imagining it. Couldn't ask for a livelier place. Oh, and when the Dementors join in at night… bloody party until dawn. That's what it is."

"Oh, well, now that you put it that way, it sounds like a blast. I'm afraid I'll have to turn down an invitation, though. You see, there's quite a bit of bad blood between me and your… fellow party-goers."

"Your loss. They're nice blokes, really. Incredibly misunderstood – judging them for feeding on people's souls is awfully harsh," he mumbled as scratched his head with a quill while looking at the crosswords. "Any idea what a five-letter word for the 'sourest-tasting piece of sweet in the Ministry of Magic' might be?"

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Try Fudge."

"Fudge…" he mumbled, writing it down. "Well, look at that. It fits! Bloke's never going to live his screw-ups down."

"No one who sends a bitch like Umbridge into Hogwarts deserves to," Sirius replied dryly.

"Oh, you don't need to tell that to me twice," the boy agreed as he closed the magazine. "Oh, well, this doesn't seem to be helping passing the time, anyway."

"That boring?"

"Terribly. All the snatchers out there are bad for business. Barely anyone comes to Diagon Alley these days – bloody creeps. If there weren't so many owl orders, Fred and I'd be bankrupt by now," the redhead said with a sigh, casually giving away his identity.

"Consider yourself in better luck than Olivander and the other ones who got their places trashed," Sirius pointed out. "Izzy actually asked about you the other day…"

George stopped breathing for a moment. "She did?" he asked in a freakishly high pitched tone. It was the surprise – nothing more than the surprise. He had a right to be surprised when a conversation just jumped from shop matters to Izzy Black asking about him. Especially when said conversation was shared with her Dad, he told himself. It certainly _couldn't _have anythingto do with any feelings he seemed to be harbouring for the girl in question. Because it _couldn't_, for whatever reason. In fact, just thinking about those feelings in front of Sirius made him fear his thoughts might somehow be overheard by him. And that would be bad… really, really bad.

"Sure," Sirius replied, apparently not noticing the way he was acting at all as he busied himself contemplating a box of fainting fancies for some reason. "She wanted to know how the shop was doing."

"Oh, the shop," he mumbled in, partially relieved she'd been referring to the shop and not specifically to him. "We're fine. The shop's doing fine, physical costumers aside."

"That's what I told her. She told me to say 'hi' to you and Fred. She's looking forward to come home for Christmas, I guess."

"Think she'll want to stay, afterwards?" George found himself asking – wishing – for whatever reason he refused to acknowledge.

Sirius sighed. "I wouldn't and I've come to realize she's far too much like me in this kind of thing," he said. "Oh, but if it gets really bad in the meanwhile…"

George nodded before he had a chance to finish. _Big, fat hypocrite_. He knew well enough he wouldn't leave the bloody school until his very life depended on it…

"Anyway, I came here thinking I was supposed to meet you, Fred and Moony," Sirius pointed out.

"Well, today's actually just Fred and Moony… oh, and Lee too. Lee Jordan. Fred and I are taking turns at watching the shop while the other's busy with our…" he lowered his tone, "little project now that Verity's decided to go underground. Anyway, I assume Tonks has already brought you up to date."

"More like showed up at my place, woke up my kid, told me I was needed elsewhere and mocked me some more. Oh, and when I tried to annoy her, she didn't even have the decency to look bothered in the slightest. She smiled!" he told the younger boy. "Can you believe it?"

"Yeah, she's been weird that way lately. All… agreeable," George mumbled. "The other day, Lee made an unfortunate comment about the amount of food she ate and she just laughed it off like it was nothing. It was kind of disturbing – I thought pregnant women were supposed to try to kill you for stuff like that."

"Normal ones, yeah," Sirius agreed.

"The only things that set her off these days are Moony overreacting about her stressing or straining herself and…"

"…calling her by her actual name," Sirius finished for him. "Yeah. I noticed. Women… Trust me when I tell you that as much as you think you know about them, sooner or later they'll blindside you. Mark my words, George, because they will."

George nodded slightly awkwardly. There was something inherently odd about Sirius Black giving him advice on women, even if it was the mildest possible kind. And, once again, no, he told himself – it had nothing to do with him… fancying Izzy.

"Anyway, Tonks didn't tell me much," Sirius continued. "She did mention the wireless, though… Didn't really get that one, to be honest."

"Oh, you will when you see it. They're setting everything up in the lower storeroom," George informed him, pointing at the doorway behind him. "You take this door, than the one on the left and then you'll find a stairway at the bottom of the room, behind all the boxes. Take it and you'll find them down there."

"Should I be scared of what I might find out down there?"

George raised an eyebrow. Funny that Izzy had asked a very similar question during their chat at the train station, months before. "Well, knowing you have little problem with breaking the law, I'd go for 'no'. Now, if you'll excuse, I'm going to actually try and sell something today. It's a sad Halloween when the only sales you make are owl-ordered."

Halloween? he thought in surprise, noticing for the first time there was a smiling jack-o'-lantern on the counter. Was it still Halloween? He had to say he'd more or less lost track of time ever since Mia and Izzy had left to Hogwarts but, Merlin, if asked he'd swear they were already nearing the end of November… It sure had felt that long in his mind.

He groaned, not only annoyed at how slowly time was passing but also at the fact that he'd remembered Halloween at all. Once upon a time, he's actually adored that day – all the pranks and the feast at Hogwarts… of course, that was before his best friends had been murdered and he'd been arrested on Halloween. That had basically ruined the day for him, making it so much easier to swallow when he didn't recall it at all. How long had it been, really? He asked himself as he followed George's instructions into the lower storeroom. Fifteen? Sixteen years?

"_I told you it cannot go there! If it went there, it would fit there!_" a voice remarkably similar to George's was saying when he started descending the stairs.

"_Then where does it go?_"

"_I dunno. Definitely not there!_"

"_Didn't this come with instructions?_" a third voice, Moony's, inquired.

"_Instructions? From the looks of it, this thing's older than my great-aunt Muriel. And that's saying a lot, trust me,_" the first voice – no doubt Fred's – said.

"Hey! This is prime-quality material. My uncle says they used it in WWN for more than fifty years!" Lee Jordan was telling his redheaded friend just as Sirius stepped into the messy lower storeroom, quickly spotting Remus standing behind a pile of what seemed to be old sound-related devices, using his wand to as a light source as he observed it closer, while Fred and Lee stood by, covered in dust and looking slightly annoyed.

"Ah, Sirius," Remus said when he spotted him. "We've been expecting you."

"Why do I feel like I've just walked in something very ilegal?" he asked as he eyed the expressions on three fellow's faces.

"Because you just have," Fred cheerfully said. "Welcome to what's sure to be the best damn pirate wireless station there ever was."

Sirius looked at him, then at Remus and Lee in disbelief. "Are you serious? You're planning to set up an underground wireless station?"

"Not planning – _doing_ it," Lee announced.

"What on earth for?" he asked. Somehow, starting a wireless station out of the blue simply seemed like quite a pointless thing to do with a bloody war going on.

Fred snorted. "What do you think? I'll give you clue: it's _not _to offer people Celestina Warbeck songs all day long."

"Well, obviously there won't be any music or anything," Remus explained. "It's mostly… let's call it a mean of spreading the truth. I don't think I have to tell you about the amount of lies the Daily Prophet and the public wireless stations have been spreading lately. Basically, just the Quibbler is publishing the truth these days."

"And, let's be honest, it's only a matter of time before they find a way to stop Xeno from printing it," Fred logically pointed out. "So, we figured it was only fair we did our own part on keeping the truth circulating out there and when Lee here had the idea of coming up with our own pirate wireless station, we knew it was meant to be."

"It's much harder to stop the news from spreading when they're going straight into people's homes," Lee explained.

"So I suppose you should consider this your formal invitation to join our little mission," Fred stated. "It'd be a crime to leave any Marauder out of this."

Sirius gave the younger boy a look of surprise before turning to look at his best friend. "You want me to _host _an underground wireless station?"

"Well, not _host_, really_," _Fred said. "Lee here's the one with the knack for public-speaking, so most of the job falls on him. George and I will be taking turns as co-hosts too if he needs to - We're trying to pass as a single bloke – a set of twins with a problem with authority would scream our names far too loudly for our identities to remain secret… or so Lee here says. As for you, well, you're supposed to pop in every once in a while and… I dunno, share with people the stuff you know about defending themselves, make them see just how stupid that blood-purity crap is… tell them actual news about Hogwarts since you have Mia as a source inside. You won't even have to speak if you don't want to. Just help us out – if this thing is going to work, we need to give advice from people who actually know what they're doing and, well, this is sort of our first war, so…" He stopped talking, considering the point made. "We figured you of all people would want to help."

He did, Sirius thought, as he turned to Remus. He really, really did. "You're in on this too, Moony?"

He nodded. "Of course. And so is Dora. And Kingsley. People need to know what's actually happening in the world – it's time we did something about that. Of course, it's a big decision. We understand if you need ti…"

"I'm in," he declared.

"You're in?" Remus asked, surprised at how easily he'd agreed to it. "Just like that? No questions?"

Sirius nodded. "Let me put this simple for you, Moony: I've got to do something about this war, either it is fighting a battle or just keeping people's minds out of the illusions their side tries to paint. I just need to do something or else I'm pretty sure I'll head down the 'stupid' path, which I can't really afford because I've got kids at home who need me in a non-stupid capacity. This," he said, pointing at the wireless-broadcasting material, "is something. And not a stupid something."

"Bloody right it isn't," Fred mumbled.

"So, what can I do for now?" Sirius asked, quite eager to start.

"Well, take your pick," Lee said. "We need a name, we need nicknames because we sure as hell won't be using ours just to get our arses on a wanted poster…"

"We need security measures," Remus added. "Kingsley's already thinking of that, by the way, but I suppose that's one of those areas where we can never have too much."

"And, more importantly," Fred said, eying the all the instruments piled up nearby. "We need to figure out how the hell that stuff is supposed to work."

"Well," Sirius mumbled, grinning eagerly. "Looks like we've got ourselves quite the plan to make."

Sirius Black was back.

**Hogwarts, later that evening**

"He's leaving the office!" Izzy announced out loud, prompting Ginny, Neville and Luna to join her as she observed the Marauder's map in the Room of Requirement. "See? There," she said, pointing Snape's dot on the map. "He's headed to the feast."

"That's it," Ginny said. "This is our cue. We need to get in there now."

Even before they knew what exactly Snape was so badly hiding from Harry in his office, they'd planned the theft for weeks in the utmost secrecy. It wasn't that they didn't trust the rest of the DA to help out, Izzy constantly told herself, but that matter was simply too sensitive to be shared with twenty-odd people they had just gathered after a year of disbandment. Only herself, Ginny, Neville and later Luna had been in on the plan – having had each other's backs on at least a couple of different battles, none of them had any shadow of a doubt they could trust the rest.

So, it had begun. Weeks of discussion and split shifts of surveillance ranging from actually staking out Snape's office several times a day to following his and the Carrows' dots on the Marauders' map for hours at a time. It was morose work but it needed to be done if they wanted to find a pattern, a routine, a weakness… anything they could grab and use against them. Anything that could make it easier for them to get to Snape's office and steal whatever he was hiding in there.

By mid-October, they knew Amycus and Alecto spent a very unhealthy amount of time together in each other's quarters, they knew they never took breakfast before ten in the morning and never retired to their quarters before two or three in the morning after bullying a bunch of poor house-elves in the school kitchens – that was, when they weren't using students for such purposes during their nasty detention sessions. As for Snape, they knew he barely left his quarters for anything other than meals those days, which gave them a big problem in what came to slipping in and out of it unnoticed…

But as much as they knew about their opponents' routines by then, they still had no idea what exactly they were trying to steal. Neville had been sure it was some sort of weapon; Izzy and Ginny had hoped it might be a Horcrux (although they never shared that with their friends) so they could destroy it for Harry even though they had no clue of how to achieve such a thing; Luna, on the other hand, had believed it was an infinity of things, each somehow more bizarre than the other – and, although they immediately discarded her suggestions in their minds, they always nodded and said 'it might be', mostly for the sake of not hurting her.

In the end, Neville had been the right one of the four of them. It was, according to what their house's faithful ghost had shared with them only five days before Halloween – having been spying on the Carrows for them –, a weapon: Gryffindor's sword. The sword Harry had used to kill the basilisk and save Ginny's life in his second year… the sword that was rightfully his according to Dumbledore's will. And, although none of them would question the fact that by being a founder's weapon the sword was warranted a certain… specialty, they couldn't help but wonder what sort of quality in it caused that object in particular to become such a threat in Harry's hands… There were a hundred swords all over the castle's hallways being held by suits of armour. There were a thousand swords in the country as well. Not to mention that a wan could cause far more danger on its own than a boatload of swords. So, what sort of special power made that one in specific so important?

Ultimately, those were just questions that didn't really matter. They were taking it, anyway – after all, if Voldemort wanted to keep the sword from Harry so badly, it had undoubtedly to be useful to him. How they'd get it to him, though, was a whole other matter. A matter for later because, with just five days in advance, they came to realize Halloween was going to present their best chance to get in and out of Snape's office unnoticed, since the feast was bound to keep the headmaster out of it for at least a good couple of hours.

"A… are you sure that map is accurate?" Neville asked as he stood by Izzy's side. It wasn't that he didn't trust Izzy and Ginny, but having just been introduced to that particular tool a few weeks before, he couldn't help but finding it far too conveniently powerful to be true. Even for wizard-standards. "Because if it isn't, we might just be walking straight into the Snape…"

"The map never lies, Neville," Izzy assured him. "It never did to me or to Harry or to my dad, who was the first to use it. No reason why it'd start doing it now."

"It is a wonderful device," Luna said in a dreamy tone. "I thought the only one to exist was the one the ministry keeps locked in the Department of Mysteries to spy on everyone…"

Ginny, Izzy and Neville glanced at each other with looks of uncertainty on their faces. They might be ninety-nine-per-cent sure that that was just another one of the Lovegoods' trademark odd theories but just the thought of anything watching over them like pieces on a chessboard was unsettling enough…

"Well, we should get going. We're wasting time here," Ginny decided. "The longer we delay this, the longer we have to stay away from the feast and the more chance people may notice our absence."

"Wait, what about the Carrows?" Neville asked.

"On their way to the Great Hall," Izzy said, tracing their dots with her hands. "There. Always attached at the hip. You'd think they were conjoint twins or something…"

Luna giggled in her usual calm manner. "That's silly. They'd have to be identical twins for that…"

"Well, whatever kind of twins they are or aren't, as long as they stay away from us, I'm fine with it," Ginny mumbled. "Alright, everyone ready? If you want to change your minds, now it's the time. No one will blame anyone here."

"I think we're already past that, Ginny," Neville said. "But does anyone have any Felix Felicis spare?"

Izzy sighed as she eyed her mum's dot on the map… yep, her mother was going to kill her if she got wind of what they were doing without telling her. Then again, if she told her mother, Izzy had no doubt they'd be stopped by her and that was something she simply refused to let happen. She could only hope her mother wouldn't hear of it until they'd already succeeded at getting their hands on the sword… and, yep, a vial of Felix sure wouldn't hurt to achieve that. "I wish. Slughorn didn't brew it this year. I don't think he wanted it to fall into the wrong hands… But, Merlin, it'd be a huge help."

"It'd also be a huge risk," Ginny pointed out.

Luna nodded and, that time, when she spoke they had no doubt of the truthfulness of her words. "Felix Felicis has caused more despair than luck along the centuries. Too much of a good thing can be worse than just a little of a bad one."

Neville couldn't help nodding. "Yeah, well, if we get caught…"

"We won't," Ginny said.

"… I'm glad we're at least trying," he finished. "Because it's time we do something other than sitting at class hearing the barbarities those people are trying to teach us. I don't want to be the guy who sits down while everything happens around him."

"That makes two of us," Izzy mumbled.

"Three of us," Ginny added.

"Four," Luna finished.

"So, I guess this is it," he mumbled. "We leave it up to luck."

Ginny shook her head. "Not luck. We leave it up to ourselves. We do our best and if that's not enough… well, then it was never meant to be, I guess."

It'd better be… meant to be, that was, Izzy thought on their way down to the headmaster's office. Because if it wasn't… She shook her head. It wasn't the time to think of the worst. Not then, not there.

They found the corridor leading to the headmaster's office completely empty – these days, people actually avoided it, as well as the corridors leading to the Carrows' quarters… any chance of meeting any of them was to be avoided, most people believed.

"Looks like the coast is clear," Ginny whispered as they took slow steps towards the statue guarding the stairway that led to the headmaster's office. "We need the password," she said, looking back. "Luna?"

The blonde girl smiled, apparently glad to be useful. "I have it," she stated, taking a step further, closer to the statue. "_Emerald Green,_" she whispered, causing the statue to suddenly shake and start making way to the stairs.

"Emerald Green?" Ginny asked in distaste. She could only imagine what Snape thought whenever he said it: a bull's eyes on each of Harry's eyes or maybe something Slytherin-related. Somehow, she felt like it was related to Harry…

"He's a creepy bloke," Izzy mumbled as they started climbing up the spiral staircase after Ginny. "Obviously he was going to pick a creepy password."

"I cringe to think of what we might find upstairs," Neville mumbled behind her.

"That's the least you should cringe about," Ginny mumbled as she reached the hall on top of the stairs. "We ought to worry about other things like what's going to happen to us once we touch that doorknob …" she stated, pointing at a door opposite them on the hall. "Snape seems like the sort of bloke who'd leave little traps around to keep invaders out."

"Oh, I know a spell for that," Luna announced, taking a step closer to it at the same time she reached for her wand. "_Vomica Revelium_," she said, flickering the wand with a quick move. A wave of clear vapour came from the doorknob, causing her to smile. "There doesn't seem to be anything here that would harm us. There'd be black smoke of there was."

"Great. Now what's left to know is if it will open at all," Izzy mumbled.

"Well, only one way to find out," Luna said with a smile, resting her hand on the doorknob and turning it without hesitation.

"No, Luna, don't just…"

The lock clicked and they crumbled in relief. Luna was fine. The door was open… It was going to happen. It was actually going to happen. They were getting in and they were taking the sword. That easily… And, as much as Izzy's gut told her it was too easy, she didn't listen. They were so close…

With a soft push, the door opened to reveal an office quite different from what they all remembered. The layout of it was rather similar but the instruments that were its main trait back when Dumbledore was in charge seemed to be gone. Izzy supposed they should be thankful for the change as that left much less places to search.

"_What do you think you are doing?_" An angry voice shouted from inside the office, making them all cringe.

"_Children, you don't want to do this. Leave now before…_" another faceless voice said.

"Who's this?" Neville said, stepping in ahead of Luna and the others.

"_Well, who do you think it is_?" the first voice asked sternly.

Izzy, Ginny and Luna stepped in after the boy, looking around to try and find the source of the voice. Unnoticed to them, the door slowly closed behind their backs.

"_You have made a terrible mistake. A terrible mistake_," the second voice told them sadly.

"What mistake?" Ginny asked, turning around and looking for someone hidden. "Who are you?"

"_Oh, for Merlin's sake! Back here! Behind the desk!_" the stern voice said, making them all turn to face the portraits of the late headmasters, only three of which seemed to be occupied at the moment: the one with Dumbledore, who looked asleep and nowhere close to waking up, and two others, one quite severe-looking and heavy on silver and green tones, the other portraying a warm-looking man who eyed them rather sadly. "_Ah! Surprised? Didn't think there'd be anyone in here? Of course you wouldn't. No one ever thinks of us portraits_," the severe one said.

He was, Izzy noted, right. And, she supposed, they were basically doomed thanks to that. Why hadn't they thought of the stupid portraits? "Who exactly are you?" she asked it, annoyed.

"_Who am I? Who am I?_" he replied angrily. "_Youth_," he said in disgust. "_The more years pass, the more disrespectful they get. You should be ashamed, girl. You really should. I, at least, have the decency of recognizing my own kin._"

"Your own what?" Ginny asked as her friend simply stared at the mad portrait.

"_Kin_!" he shouted at the redhead before looking back at Ginny. "_A Black, aren't you, girly? Of course you are. You have the Black-family eyes. And, of course, your father's absolute lack of respect for family and for order. Had I known this would be what our family would fall into… Had I known…!_"

Izzy stared at him some more. "Oh, Merlin, it's you, isn't it? Dad told me about you. You're Phinley or Phoney…"

"_Phineas_!" he shouted. "_Professor Phineas Nigellus Black_."

"He's related to you?" Neville asked Izzy in a whisper.

"Unfortunately…" she mumbled in return. "We had a portrait of you back home when we moved in, hadn't we?"

"_Well, of course you had! Until you had that wretched creature you call a house-elf moving it to the attic! The disrespect! The nerve!_"

"Don't speak like that about Kreacher!" Izzy replied angrily. "And we moved you to the attic because, if I recall it well, you insulted Mum. You called her a… a…"

"_A Scarlet Woman_," he repeated. "_Why, that was quite accurate, wasn't it? With a bastard child by that good-for-nothing great-great-great-grandson of mine!_"

"Hey!" she said in disbelief. She supposed in a way him calling her a bastard was indden accurate, giving her having been born long before her parent's marriage but that still wasn't something she liked to be called. Of course, she'd much rather be known as a bastard than as the 'worst headmaster Hogwarts had ever had' like certain portraits in the room.

"_Phineas_!" the other portrait said in a disapproving tone. "_You shouldn't treat family that way! I was under the impression Blacks valued their family, even if in rather… blood-supremacist ways._"

"_Mind your own business, Scamander,_" Phineas replied in an arrogant tone.

"Scamander?" Luna asked, her face lighting like the sunrise. "Professor Newt Scamander?"

"_That would be me_," the portrait confirmed with a sigh.

"Oh, I love your work! _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ is my favourite book in the world. I take it everywhere – even when Daddy and I took the Summer to go looking for Crumple-Horned Snorkacks. It's a pity you didn't have a chance to write about them in your book…"

"_Oh, lovely_," Phineas spat dryly.

Scamander, however, although he seemed quite taken aback by the girl's words, mostly the part about the Snorkacks, offered her a small smile. "_You're very kind, dear girl. But I'm afraid today you've made a terrible, terrible mistake by coming here. But it's too late now… whatever you're looking for wasn't worth it. It simply wasn't worth it._"

"But we _need_ it," Ginny said. "It… it's not Snape's . It's not his to keep."

"_I'm afraid it's inevitable he does now, girl,_" Scamander said. "_But what is it?_"

"_Oh, you know what it is, Scamander_," Phineas Black said. "_What would a group of Gryffindors be looking for?"_

"I'm actually a Ravenclaw," Luna softly pointed out.

Phineas made a mocking sound. "_Of course… A herd of Gryffindors and an hairheaded Ravenclaw, then. What would they be looking for other than the sword of Gryffindor? That is school property, girlie,_" he told Ginny. "_If Professor Snape wants to keep it, he's entitled to as the Headmaster_."

"Snape's no headmaster. He killed his way into that spot!" Neville said, pointing at Dumbledore's portrait.

"_Rumours. For all I know, Potter did it. Such a disturbed mind…_" Black mumbled.

"_You _have the disturbed mind," Ginny replied angrily. "And we're wasting too much time. Izzy, Neville, the three of us ought to search different spots. Luna… Izzy, give her the map. She can serve as a lookout."

Izzy nodded, removing the map from her pocket and using her wand to activate it before handing it to the blonde girl.

"_Professor Snape will hear about this,_" Phineas promised as Ginny and Neville started to look for hidden compartments under tables and tapestries. "_I assure you I will narrate every second of your…_"

"No, you won't," Izzy told him.

"_How will you make sure of that, girlie? By burning my portrait? Because I can just travel to another…_"

"No," Izzy said, her mind racing for a solution. "I… I…" She paused and took a breath. "If you don't tell Snape, I will personally make sure your attic portrait back home gets mailed to the Malfoys."

"What?" Ginny asked, stopping her search.

"I will," Izzy assured them before looking straight at her ancestor's portrait. "You'd want that, wouldn't you? To be with a branch of the family that actually respects your ideals. I'm sure Narcissa would welcome you with open arms. If you keep quiet, I'll make sure your portrait leaves the attic and reaches her."

"_How can I be sure you're telling the truth?_"

"Because the cards are on your side of the table. Besides, what else would I do with your damn portrait?" she pointed out. "Both sides would profit from this deal, trust me. What would you say?"

The portrait shrugged. "_It won't matter anyway_," he mumbled.

Izzy smiled, taking that as a 'yes'. Triumphant, she turned to Newt Scamander afterwards. "Can we count on your silence too, Professor?"

"_I have no sympathy to usurpers of what should be a sacred position in this school, Miss Black_," Scamander assured her. "_That said, the only reason why I didn't follow my predecessors when they decided not to remain in their portraits providing counsel to the current headmaster is the fact that I believe it is still my job to keep my students out of trouble. I will keep doing it until Professor Snape banishes me out of here. However, Miss Black, even though you can count on my silence, I'm afraid Phineas is right when he says it won't matter_."

"What do you mean?" Neville asked.

"He's coming back," Luna said suddenly, her tone for that first time taking a frightened edge.

"What?" Izzy asked loudly as Ginny rushed to their blonde friend's side in order to look at the map herself.

"Snape's on his way here and the Carrows are following him," the redhead confirmed in alarm. "We need to get out! Fast! He's close. Mischief managed," she said, pointing her wand at the map and snatching it into her robes.

"But the sword…" Neville said.

"Forget the sword! Just putting everything back the way it was," Izzy told him, heading to the door. "Maybe we can still leave without him…" She paused when, upon trying to open the door back up, she found herself unable to. "Oh, no."

"What is it?" Luna asked.

"It won't open!" Izzy said in alarm, trying to force the door open.

"It has to open!" Ginny yelled, reaching for her wand and pointing it at the lock. "_Alohamora._" When nothing happened, she kicked it. "Come on, you stupid door! Open!"

"Maybe the lock is broken," Neville told her as he approached it. "Let me try repairing it."

He did and so did Izzy and Ginny and Luna as well. Nothing worked. They were locked in.

"Okay. We'll blast it off," Izzy decided. "The four of us at the same time should be able…"

"_It won't work, Miss Black_," Scamander said behind them, making them all turn back to him.

"Why not?" Ginny asked in despair. "We need to get out of here!"

"_I understand but I'm afraid you can't. That's what I've been trying to tell you, dear girl. The problem with this office's wards is not coming in but instead getting out_," Professor Scamander told her, his face covered with a genuine look of sadness. "_I tried to stop you but…_"

"_You ought to have listened while you could_," Phineas told them. "_But you didn't, of course. Students and their smart little minds never do. Professor Snape has known there were intruders in his office from the moment you stepped foot in here. So you see, girl_," he added, looking straight at Izzy, "_what I meant when I said your promises wouldn't matter. Odds are you won't get out of here in a good enough state to keep them…_"

Desperate, Izzy looked at Ginny, Neville and Luna. "So, we're pretty dead, aren't we?" she asked, receiving only nervous gulps and dead silence in return.

And, as she heard the door behind her clicking, she wondered if Phineas Black would be the only one getting a promise broken by her that day.

**A/N: Someone's in trouble... I hope you didn't find this chapter very bad. As I said, it didn't come out the way I wanted it to... Feedback is welcome, as always! Review!**


	54. Back and Forth

**A/N: So, here I am posting a few days earlier than my usual month-long breaks since tomorrow I will be leaving for my first break in many, many months and heading to an undisclosed city that may or may not have a colosseum in it, as well as a boatload of beautiful piazzas where I will be enjoying local specialties such as pizza, lasagna and such... I hope you like this chapter - the length of the chapter is out of control, let me tell you. I promise myself I won't do any more than 5k words but then they always end up doubling that. Enjoy... **

So, they weren't dead, after all, but, for a moment or two as she sat with her fellow culprits in Snape's office, Izzy kind of wished they were. Because, really, being glared and yelled at by a livid Severus Snape felt much worse than a killing curse as far as her mind could picture it. Especially, she added, with the Carrows lurking in the corner, shooting them looks that clealy said 'I'm going to have so much fun with you lot later'… and not a good sort of fun, she imagined.

"The insolence! The nerve!" Snape yelled in a fury for what had to be the tenth time, pacing in front of them as the four occupied uncomfortably hard chairs in the centre of his office. He looked green with anger and, strangely, not in a figurative way. On the wall, Phineas Nigellus glared as well, shaking his head disapprovingly at them while at the same time sort of smirking in an 'I told you so' sort of way. Scammander, however, regarded them sadly.

Izzy glanced at Ginny, who was slumped against the back of the chair with her arms crossed, and then at Neville, who stared at the stared at the floor, avoiding catching a glimpse of Snape at any cost. Luna, however, looked perfectly calm, as if she hadn't really grasped what was really happening.

"An unacceptable _disrespect_ towards your headmaster," Amycus prompted, purposely making his comment sound more like an insult to Snape than a lecture to the culprits.

Snape, however, ignored him. "Naturally, I ought to expect something like this from a _Black_," he shouted, taking a clear jab at Izzy. "_And _of course, this coming from those barbarian twins' little apprentice wasn't that far-fetched either," he added, aiming Ginny a glare. "Longbottom, however…" he shook his head in distaste. "Stupidity seems to have no bounds with you. As for Miss Lovegood…" he looked at her, completely clueless of what to do or say with that one. Part of him actually asked itself if she had any idea of what was going on. "A Ravenclaw ought to know better than… than to associate with such a trio of misfits! Sheer impertinence beyond belief! To think you could possibly get away with invading this office! And what for, might I ask? What for?"

That time, the four of them looked at each other but still didn't say a word to the headmaster, which prompted the Carrows to step closer, looking quite determined. Alecto was the first to act, grabbing Neville by the chin and forcing him to look at her. "Your headmaster asked you a question!" she yelled.

"Leave us alone with them for a minute, Snape. I'm sure Alecto and I can make them loosen their tongues," Amycus suggested.

Izzy gulped, thinking of ways they might get them to blab, each worse than the former. Maybe even about more than they appeared to want to know at the moment… She and Ginny certainly knew enough to get Harry into trouble if they were fed veritaserum or worse… The fact that Voldemort wasn't quite aware Harry was hunting Horcruxes rather than just being on the run was a big piece of leverage on her brother's side. A big piece of leverage they couldn't take away.

"We just wanted to play a prank," Ginny said all of a sudden, making them all turn their faces to her, even Neville with Alecto's hand grabbing his face. The look her friend gave them urged them to trust her judgement but Izzy wasn't still quite sure if even Ginny would manage to convince Snape all they wanted to do was to prank him. "We were annoyed that all Hogsmeade weekends were cancelled and that Christmas break is going to be cut to ten days, so we thought we'd sneak in here during the feast and turn everything into gravestones and fake skeletons. It was just a Halloween prank…"

"They're lying!" Alecto declared, violently letting go of Neville's jaw as if she was trying to detach it away from his face. "Of course they're lying! You know what these little bastards wanted, Severus. Keeping it here was a mistake! We told you so!"

"Alecto is right. Even a bunch of kids can break through the joke you call 'wards'. And they're Potter's friends – everyone knows it," Amycus declared, glaring at them. "You know they were trying to help him by getting the…"

"_Enough!_" Shape shouted, glaring at them. "I will not say this again after today: it was me who was given _that matter_ to handle, not you. If you think that's not right, I suggest you take it straight to the source of the orders who, I imagine, won't take having his judgement questioned too well. As for getting into this office," he added, turning to the culprits, "I'm sure our… pupils here will be able to tell you getting in was the least of their worries as opposed to getting out. Isn't that right, Miss Black?" he asked Izzy directly, given that she was sitting right opposite him.

"Yes," she said through her teeth, praying he'd buy Ginny's excuse.

"Still doesn't prove they were really here just for 'pranking'," Alecto pointed out. "For instance, where are those fake gravestones at? The ones Weasley told they were turning your things into. I'd say they had more than enough time to have some work done."

Snape pursed his lips for a moment, knowing he simply couldn't avoid that question, and turned his face Ginny. "Miss Weasley?"

Before the redhead could say anything, though, a throat was cleared behind the headmaster's desk, making them all turn to face Phineas Nigellus Black's portrait. "_If I may_," it said, narrowing eyes at his great-who-knew-how-many-times-great-granddaughter. "_I believe I have an answer for that_."

Izzy positively froze – the bastard was going give them away. She knew he was. Merlin, if she ever made it home again, she was going to fetch his portrait from the attic and use it as firewood… no, she was going to let Alex draw all over it, trash it some more and then slowly let it burn just so she could throw the ashes down the toilet. She wondered how much a portrait could feel when stabbed…

"Then please, Professor Black," Snape said in a dry tone, "feel free to share."

"Oh, I'm more than happy to," Phineas told him. "_Such disgraceful behaviour. By my own blood, no less, I'm shamed to admit_," he added, shooting Izzy a look, as if him ratting them out wasn't bad enough. "_But I'm glad to say it's Longbottom we have to thank for this little revengeful plan having been anything but successful_."

"Longbottom?" Amycus asked sceptically at the same time Ginny stepped really hard on Neville's foot to keep him from asking the same thing.

"_Yes, Longbotton_," Phineas stated. "_That bottomless pit of stupidity – I can find no other adjective good enough to classify him – was trying to cover the office with fake spiderwebs when he ended up tangling himself all over with it. Needless to say, as the gutless moron he is, he shamed the whole male gender by screaming his lungs out as if he was being choked by Devil's Snare and his friends had to come to the rescue. As you may imagine, by the time they managed to banish the webs away without – unfortunately – banishing that squirming excuse for a human being on the way, you were already arriving back._"

Izzy had to use all her self-control not to openly stare at the portrait. He was lying for them. Lying and being surprisingly good at it. For the first time in her life, she felt an overwhelming urge to kiss the portrait of a disgusting human being… and then rip it to shreds because he was being such at arse by picturing Neville as a gutless weenie.

"Is this accurate?" Snape asked Scammander's portrait.

It nodded, as they expected it would. "I believe Phineas may have exaggerated his account of the boy's reaction but, yes, it's rather accurate. An unfortunate decision from the students' part but children will be children," he said.

"_Children_ need discipline," Amycus told the portrait, silently ordering it to mind its own business. "We'll handle the punishment, Severus. Alecto and I will make sure they learn to respect their school's head." _Seeing as you can't seem to teach them that yourself, _it read between the lines. "We'll give them a few nights of detention… a week might be enough, if we put enough _effort_ to it."

Izzy gulped. Yep, they were doomed. They were really doomed beyond salvation. The Carrows were going to smash them to little pieces.

"I'm afraid I will have to decline," Snape stiffly, making them all look at him in surprise and turning the Carrows' faces into expressions of outrage at being dismissed.

"There really is no need for you to waste time with these…"

"Alecto, please remind me whose office was broken into…" The woman didn't respond, which had Snape raising his eyebrows. "Thank you. That will be all. I will be taking it from here. By _myself._" And he promptly turned his back on them.

Izzy half expected the Carrows'response to be in the shape of a killing curse. For once, she hoped that wasn't the case – better the evil one knew than the evil one didn't and, between Snape and the Carrows, she'd at least been dealing with the first since she was ten, even though most recent developments had certainly upgraded the former Potions Master to a whole new level of evil… Of course, as far as her imagination went, she honestly couldn't picture Snape's worst punishment being much worse than Carrows' mildest.

"You're treading on thin ice, Snape," Amycus said through his teeth before he and Alecto motioned towards the door.

"I'll keep that in mind, thank you," he replied, glaring in disapproval at the rather open words or defiance. "Oh, and please fetch their house's heads. Professor McGonagall and Professor Flictwick. Bring them up to date on this matter – I imagine they would like to know what their students are up to on Halloween."

It might seem like a mild request for anyone else but the Carrows clearly took that as an insult since they closed the door with a bang on their way out. A reminder that Snape was in charge. Izzy really had never been more thankful for Snape and the Carrows's animosity before…

"Foolish, foolish children," Snape hissed just as soon as he found himself alone in the office with the four of them. "All of you. Pranking teachers. Pranking _me?_" Strangely, whenever he said 'pranking', the word came out with such disgust one might have thought it was a synonym of 'assassination attempt' or something. "The nerve… the audacity!"

The headmaster paced around mumbling to himself, glaring at them and also at Dumbledore's comatose portrait on occasion. All of them could safely say they had absolutely no idea what he was thinking, other than that it couldn't be good.

"Get it into your troublemaking little heads that defying actions like this one are in no way tolerated in this school. And let me assure you that if it weren't for the current… circumstances, you'd be on your way to your dorms in order to pack your belongings and leave this school for good," he said, his tone still boiling with fury. "But as that is not an option anymore, we'll have to settle for the next best thing."

That didn't sound good. That didn't sound good at all. Sure, it was pretty clear Snape was set on not using the Carrows on their punishment but his tone… oh, it was bad. It was really bad. Bad enough that, all of a sudden, she found herself thinking of not quite Carrow-worthy and yet equally upsetting punishments. Like them having to stay at school for Christmas serving detention far away from their families… or being handed over to bodily-punishment-happy Filch… or, Merlin helped them, being locked up in one of the dungeon's supposedly newly-reinstated student cells, not so coincidently close to the Dementor's nightly paths.

"Let me think…" Snape mumbled, pacing around, apparently browsing in his mind for appropriate punishments. "Ah… perfect. You will be serving detention…"

Izzy's heart sunk – she was sure it was Christmas. He was going to take Christmas away. Easter too, maybe… She really hoped Summer wouldn't go too or else she wouldn't be laying eyes on her family again until she graduated. Merlin… Alex would be four by then – Mary would probably speak fluently next time she saw her too. Or maybe it the Dementors. Was it possible they would be serving detention guarded by Dementors? Somehow that did fit into the description of 'next best thing' to expulsion in her mind.

"… Miss Black, are you listening?"

She jumped on her chair and stared at Snape. "Yes… no. I was just… thinking."

"Well, don't. As we've already established, your thinking," he gestured at their group in general, "all of your… thinking, tends to lead to nothing more than stupidity. So do refrain yourselved from doing it. Regularly. I'm sure the world would be thankful." He cleared his throat. "But, as I was saying, all four of you will be serving detention tomorrow in the forbidden forest. And, just to be clear, by 'tomorrow' I mean tomorrow night under the light of the full moon. I'm sure you will be in very good company… _howling_ with laughter by the end of the night, no doubt."

Izzy would herself furrowing her brows. Not because she was disappointed she was going home for Christmas after all or that she wouldn't be serving detention under the Dementors' wing – no, not at all. She did furrow her brows because, for the past few weeks, they'd been charting the moon phases in Astronomy and she was fairly sure – unless she'd gotten the whole thing wrong, which was very possible because it wouldn't be the first time she'd completely mixed up her notes – that full-moon wasn't until the second night of November, which was not one but two nights away. And, while later she'd call herself all the stupidity-related insults she could possibly think of over it, before she could stop herself, she was already opening her big mouth for whatever reason. "Isn't…"

Ginny, always alert, stepped on her foot really hard before she could finish, stopping her just in time. She seemed to be doing that a lot that night. "Isn't full moon too dangerous a night to be in the Forbidden Forest?" she asked, feigning fearfulness. "There could be werewolves loose in there!"

"Well, I suggest you dig around for some silver, then," Snape suggested carelessly. "You will meet Professor Hagrid right after dinner tomorrow for your detention – I'm sure he'll find something to keep you occupied in there until it's at least past midnight because if you step foot in this castle a fraction of a second before the clock hits twelve, you'll be getting an encore performance next month and the month after. And keep in mind that the full moon in December falls roughly around Christmas… we wouldn't want to disturb your little family plans now, would we?"

They didn't respond – instead they just sat there quietly for several seconds until Snape eyed them like they were pieces of inconveniently-placed furniture and told them to go wait outside for their house's heads. "I imagine you wouldn't want to overstay your _welcome _into this office any more than you already have," the headmaster said dryly, making a careless shooing gesture with his hand.

They motioned to comply almost immediately even though it really irked them to make it easy for him – honestly, the need to get far away from him overpowered wanting to make things are for him by a lot.

Phineas's portrait, however, promptly cleared his throat juts before they reached the door. "If I may… can I have a word with the girl?" He didn't even need to specify which girl for them all to know it was Izzy.

"Make it fast," Snape grunted.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Please let your father know how disgusted I am to be related to your branch of the family. And how badly I'd like to _sever_ all connections to it."

She knew he meant every word. And she also knew he was saying that as reminder of her promise. He wanted his portrait out of their house. And who was she, really, to deny that? "I will. And, trust me, the feelings are completely mutual."

"Lovely," Snape said dryly. "If you're done sharing the pleasantries…" He gestured towards the door.

None of them dared to open their mouths again until they were already climbing down the spiral staircase.

"So," Izzy started in a whisper, "is it just me or tomorrow's…"

"…not actually full-moon," Ginny confirmed. "It's either that or we're definitely failing astronomy."

"So, Snape isn't actually feeding us to the werewolves?" Neville asked uncertainly.

Luna smiled. "That's nice of him."

"No, it isn't," Izzy replied. "I mean, it _is _nice that we won't be eaten alive but I'm pretty sure Snape doesn't know that. Can you actually picture him being nice to us? I mean, he hates my dad since… ever and Neville's been his favourite punching bag ever since he laid eyes on him. Ginny's marked too, I guess, since he's no fan of the Weasleys and you, well… I guess he has no reason to hate you other than being our friend and, well, not a Slytherin. But still, he wouldn't be helping _us. _Especially not after catching us breaking into his off…" She paused as, upon stepping out of the doorway usually hidden behind the secret passage leading up to the headmaster's office, nearly crashed into a very furious-looking McGonagall. No, she corrected herself. Not just McGonagall. McGonagall, Flitwick _and _her mother. For a moment, she felt tempted to back up and walk straight back into Snape's office.

"_Breaking into a teacher's office?_" the transfiguration master said through her teeth in a frosty tone, eyeing them all in a way that made them want to curl into a ball in the nearest corner. "The _headmaster's _office? For pranking?" She looked like she just might strangle one of them.

"I am very disappointed," Flitwick said, eyeing Luna in particular. "Very disappointed indeed, Miss Lovegood."

"We weren't…" Neville started.

McGonagall stopped him, though. "I don't want to hear it, Longbottom. Not now, anyway. Tomorrow morning before breakfast I want you, Miss Weasley and Miss Black in my office with a full explanation of what… possessed you to commit such an… atrocious display of recklessness. I want you to use tonight to think of your actions after I take you back to your dorms since for now I am needed back at the banquet before it ends. We can't have the bulk of the teaching staff disappearing on account of such a… such a…" She stopped, shaking her head. "Oh, follow me, then."

"Wait, Minerva," Mia said, speaking for the first time. "If you wouldn't mind…" she gestured with her head towards Izzy, who gulped soundly. "I'd like a word with my daughter."

"Oh, be my guest," McGonagall said before shooting Izzy a look. "First thing in the morning," she reminded her.

Izzy nodded as the old teacher turned on her heel, followed by Neville and Ginny, who shot her sheepish, yet encouraging looks, as if they were telling her to 'hang in there'. Oh, she wanted to hang in there… especially if 'hanging in there' happened to take place far away from her mum because, as much as she loved her, Izzy would jump at any opportunity to avoid a Mia Black lecture. She'd been born to give those, apparently, because they sure brought the whole motherly guilt-production to a max when she really wanted to.

But since making a run for it wasn't much of an option – not to mention that doing so would make her feel like the greatest coward to ever be born (if she couldn't handle her mother's lectures, how could she possibly think she'd ever be able to take on a Death Eater at some point?) – so it really didn't surprise her when, a minute or two later, she found herself stepping into her mother's office.

"What on Earth were you thinking?" Mia asked in a slow, oddly low tone just as soon as the door was closed behind her daughter. Furious, she eyed Izzy with blazing eyes before raising her tone by an octave. "Breaking into Snape's office? What in Merlin's name were you planning to achieve by doing that? And don't say you were trying to prank him because I like to – no, I _need to _– believe I raised a person smart enough not to do something so idiotic in a time like this."

"We weren't trying to prank anyone," Izzy told her mother. "Ginny just made that up on the spot so we wouldn't have to tell the truth…"

"Regardless of the truth, Isabelle, breaking into _Snape's _office of all places? And being caught? Do you have any idea of what I thought when I heard the Carrows giving McGonagall their account of the facts? For a moment there, I almost expected to walk in on you being carried out of the school by Dementors!"

"But we weren't," Izzy replied. "Snape just gave us detention in the forest… and he wasn't even good at doing that…"

"You were lucky! You were bloody luck, Isabelle, because the amount of trouble that going against Snape can cause you these days is… well, it's unlimited. He could have handed you over to the Carrows. You've heard the rumours about the kind of thing they do in their detentions. You know what sort of people they are. And what were you trying to achieve, anyway? What could possibly be bad enough to justify covering it up as a prank?"

Izzy hesitated before answering that. She could just foresee the reaction her mother would have. She'd get angry. Really angry.

"Isabelle Kathleen Black, I am waiting," she said in a very Mum sort of tone that Izzy, thankfully, hadn't heard directed to her in a long time. It was usually reserved to Harry when he got into big trouble at school or delayed unpacking his trunk for weeks, as usual.

"," Izzy said really fast.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" she asked. Izzy wasn't sure if she'd actually missed that or had in fact heard and was just making sure she'd gotten it right.

"The Sword of Gryffindor. We were trying to steal it," she told her.

Her mother looked at her in disbelief for what had to be a full, excruciating minute. It didn't take a genius to know that wasn't good. _At all._

"What… on _Earth _for?" Mia asked in an odd high-pitched tone. "Were you planning to stab someone with it?"

"What? No! Merlin, Mum, do you think I'm some sort of psychopath?" Izzy replied in disbelief. "We were trying to take it for Harry."

Mia eyed her in the same way Izzy imagined she would if she'd just told her she was planning to marry the Giant Squid. "For _Harry_? Why…? How? Did he contact you? Did he ask you to?"

Izzy sighed and, hoping it would help, summed up the whole story from her mother, starting with Nearly-Headless Nick letting them know Snape was guarding something they wanted away from Harry and ending with them getting caught stealing the sword. Mia, for once, didn't say a word through the explanation but her expression certainly didn't show any sign of her warming up to her actions since they were 'justified'. In fact, she seemed to get more and more tense by the second. At some point, Izzy felt tempted to just go quiet before quickly concluded she might as well hand all the facts to her mother.

"… we had to do it," she said. "If they wanted the sword away from Harry, that had to mean it would be useful to him. It's supposed to be his, anyway. Dumbledore said so in his will. Hermione told me at the wedding."

Her mother didn't respond after she went quiet. She just kept eyeing her in silence the same way she had while hearing the explanation. She was angry, Izzy knew. _Really _angry. And Izzy wasn't quite sure about which part in particular – maybe all of it. Bummer… she'd really been hoping that the fact that they'd been trying to help Harry would get points in her favour…

"You knew about all that – that the sword was here, that Harry might need it – for _weeks_," Mia started in a dangerously low tone, "and yet you didn't breathe a word to me about it until _now_? And don't say you've forgotten because I know you better than that._"_

And there it was. Izzy started to open her mouth to protest but quickly stopped herself, realizing that might not be the best of ideas. She supposed she ought to have expected that…

"Don't you understand that the one reason why I came back into this school was to be here for you?" Mia replied. "To help out when things such as this one come up?"

"Help out?" Izzy asked in disbelief. "Mum, if I told you we were planning to steal the sword before we actually did it, there's no way you'd have let us go on with the plan. And who'd get it for Harry if we didn't? You?"

"Why do you have to say that like it is so far-fetched?" Mia replied.

"Because… because you're Mum. You don't do this kind of thing. You don't… sneak around and steal things. Dad might but you… you're the straight parent. You're Mum."

"Yes, I'm _Mum_," Mia replied in an irritated tone. "I'm Mum and my job is to take care of my kids. If that involves stealing swords, robbing a bank or going down to hell and back on my own, I'll do it without a blink of an eye. Because I'm _Mum. _And there is _nothing_ I wouldn't do if that's what needed to be done in order to help you or Harry or Alex or Mary or even your father, for that matter."

Izzy didn't respond to that. She just stood there, avoiding looking her mother in the eye since she could now see that she was not only angry but also hurt. Hurt that she hadn't thought her capable of going to the utmost lengths to look after them. "It would have been worse if you'd done it instead," she mumbled, more trying to convince herself than her mother. "Snape's office is a trap. You'd have gotten caught and Merlin knows what they'd have done to you."

"Merlin knows what they could have done to _you_," Mia replied.

Izzy pursed her lips. "Nothing bad _was _done to me. Listen, I'm sorry that I didn't… that I didn't think you might actually help but I'm not sorry we tried to get the sword. It's not fair that Harry has to do this nearly on his own. I'm sorry we got caught, though…"

Mia sighed. "You're relaying far too much on those half-apologies these days," she commented before sitting down on a chair by her desk and letting out a long breath. "Why couldn't I have had calm, well-behaved children?"

"If that's what you wanted, maybe you shouldn't have married Dad."

Mia was tempted to smile at the observation because it was so true – Sirius Black's children couldn't possibly be prim and proper – but she forced herself not to because she was still furious at Izzy. What was she going to do with that girl? "So, you got detention with Hagrid," she said.

Izzy nodded as she sat down as well, occupying the sofa instead. "Only because Snape is convinced tomorrow is the full-moon. He's crossing his fingers so that we end up accidentally serving as a snack for a werewolf."

"Even if it was, he'd be disappointed," Mia couldn't help telling her. "Remus swears there aren't really werewolves in the forest – their human side wouldn't allow them to slip through the school wards even transformed. Same applies to vampires. You could call them cautionary tales, I suppose."

"Well, that's a relief," Izzy replied quietly, looking down at her hands. "I'm really sorry I… I…" What was she apologizing for, again? She wasn't sorry they'd tried to steal the sword and she wasn't sorry they hadn't told her Mum because, if they had, she'd have stopped them. But she was definitely sorry for something. She was sorry she'd hurt her mother with her lack of faith, she concluded. That sounded like too little, Izzy thought. "Would it be really bad if I said I only didn't tell you because I didn't want to give you the chance to say 'no' but that I would have if I knew you wouldn't or that you'd handle it yourself with our help?"

"Yes," her mother told her dryly. "That would be really bad. You know, sometimes you're just like your father. It's like rules only apply to the two of you in part. And then you go and do something really dumb even though you're smart enough to know better. I thought you'd promised him you wouldn't so stupid things such as this one."

"I promised I wouldn't do stupid things _unless_ I needed to," Izzy replied. "In this case, I did."

"I beg to differ," her mother countered.

Izzy sighed. She supposed they'd just have to agree to disagree on that one. "Are you telling Dad tonight?"

Her mother let out a breath before shaking her head. "I've already talked to him today. Besides", she added, "Halloween's not a good day for him. I don't want to make it worse with this."

She did feel a pang of guilt at that. Had the Carrows gotten their way, who knows if she wouldn't be joining the list of reasons why her father detested Halloween…

"We'll talk about this again tomorrow," her mother told her, getting up. "I don't want to keep you too long. Everyone must be back in their Common Rooms by now."

Izzy eyed her for a second. "You're still pretty angry, aren't you?" she asked before getting up.

Mia sighed. "I'm disappointed."

Izzy rolled her eyes as her mother approached. "Everyone knows that's mum-language for 'I'm furious'."

"I'm not furious, I'm disappointed," Mia insisted. "You know better than this, Izzy. This is not a game. If you take a step out of the line here, you could get really hurt. You were lucky today. Very lucky. Maybe next time you won't be. That's what scares me the most. Do you actually think it would bother me if Snape was upset or not otherwise? I only care because he could hurt you very badly. Him and the Carrows. How am I supposed to protect you if you don't make an effort to protect yourself?"

Izzy didn't reply. She simply followed her mother when she opened the office's door and stepped out. They walked quietly together, climbing up scarcely busy stairs and walking along mostly deserted hallways.

The more they walked, the colder it got, leading her mother to cast a patronus as she seemed to be quite suspicious that Dementors might already be wandering around. At some point, Mia circled Izzy's arms with one of her own, bringing her closer – it was around that time that they spotted a Dementor at a distance and, although the dog-shaped patronus had it backing away pretty soon, its unpleasantness made itself noticed enough.

They reached the fat lady's portrait minutes later and only then did Izzy speak.

"Should I be counting on being grounded next time we're at home?" she asked.

Mia sighed. "Depends on what your father has to say… and on what Minerva does with you tomorrow." She leaned forward and placed a kiss on her daughter's forehead. "And, for the love of Merlin, Izzy, don't do something as reckless as this again. You'll drive me and your father insane."

Izzy's only reply was wishing her mother a good night, since she wanted to avoid making promises she couldn't keep. She turned to the Fat Lady and said the password, prompting the portrait to move out of the way, which it did but only after oddly winking and whispering 'well done' to her.

Izzy frowned to herself for a second as she walked into the common room, only to find a bunch of DA members circling Neville and grilling him at all cost. Apparently, the news of their failed incursion into the headmaster's office had somehow already reached them – there was definitely a gossip problem in that school. And, of course, as soon as they saw her arriving with her own long face in place, all attentions turned to her instead, as if they were expecting to get an update on the juicy details from her.

Most were proud of them for trying, others slightly annoyed they hadn't been invited to take part on the 'prank'… either way, all of them wanted to know the details – what sort of prank it was, how they'd thought of it, how Snape's face looked upon finding them. The questions were jumbled and frantic to the point that she was barely able to answer a quarter of them. In the end, giving up, she came up with some excuse about a headache and managed to retire to her dorm, for the first time thankful she'd only find Ginny up there since their chatty dorm-mates had been banned from the school that year as Muggle-Borns… She was definitely the worst person in the world that night… barring Voldemort and his followers, of course.

McGonagall's voice reached her ears just as she touched the doorknob to make her way into the dorm, moodily telling everyone downstairs to go to bed since there would be classes early the following day. There was whining and protesting but she soon heard the sound of steps making their way up the staircase and quickly retreated into the dorm in order to avoid them.

Inside, Ginny stood near the window, looking at the moon on the sky and at the moon chart they'd been drawing up in class. "Okay, tomorrow is definitely _not_ full moon," the redhead said, not even needing to turn around to know she was the one behind her. "Now all we have to do is hope Snape doesn't realize that."

"Even if he does, Mum says Remus told her there aren't usually werewolves or vampires in the forest – it's just something they made up to keep us out."

Ginny raised an eyebrow as she turned around. "Really?"

Izzy nodded. "There's plenty of dangerous stuff in there, though, but I guess saying 'don't go into the forest, you might be marked by a lethifold' isn't as scary as 'you might be eaten by a werewolf'," she explained, sitting on her bed as her friend did the same on hers.

"Aren't lethifolds… or lethifoldi, whatever their plural is, only found in tropics?"

"Maybe – you get my point, though," Izzy dismissed. "We should be fine with Hagrid. We'll probably end up having a decent time with him and all. We got lucky."

Ginny nodded. "We did… although I'm pretty sure McGonagall will hand an extra dose of detention to us tomorrow if we keep the prank version up. She certainly hinted at that…"

"So did Mum. You think we should tell her?" Izzy asked. "I told my mum."

Ginny looked thoughtful for a long moment. "Probably not. Your Mum's a different case – she far more filled into the truth than McGonagall. It doesn't really make a difference that she knows why we did it now that it's done since she knows basically everything, anyway. As for everyone else, until this blows over, the less people who know we were after the sword, the better. It's not that we don't trust McGonagall – it's just…"

"Need to know basis," Izzy finished for her. "Yeah, I get it."

"Good. Anyway, how bad was it? With your Mum, I mean," Ginny asked.

Izzy sighed. "Bad. Then it was worse. Then it was a bit better. Then it was… awkward."

"Complicated, then," the redhead concluded.

"Definitely," she agreed. "And, judging by the crowd downstairs, it looks like we're the new heroes around here."

Ginny groaned in annoyance. "Don't mention it. I practically had to kick a bunch of people on the face to escape. We're not even 'heroes' for the right reasons. All that planning for this… now Harry'll never get the bloody sword…"

"Yeah," Izzy mumbled faintly, looking down. "Maybe if we'd waited a little longer, we'd have figured the wards out…"

"It's done, Izzy," Ginny said, a sense of finality in her tone. "It's done and we can't undo it. No use crying over spilled milk. We need to move forward now. Doesn't mean it doesn't suck, but well…"

"Move forward how?" Izzy asked.

Her redheaded friend shrugged. "Depends on what Snape and the Carrows come up with next. You'll have to ask Trelawney if it's the future you want to hear about."

"Somehow I feel like I'd rather find out myself by letting it unfold," she stated. "Prophecies are nothing but trouble."

Ginny sighed. "Tell me about it."

Her friend didn't need to say a word for Izzy to be sure she was thinking of Harry… "I'm sure he'll do fine without the sword," Izzy lied for the sake of trying to make Ginny feel better. "I mean, if Dumbledore really needed Harry to get it, he surely would've found a more effective way for him to get it than just leaving it to him on his will…"

The redhead gave her a sceptical look. "It still doesn't change the fact that You-Know-Who really wanted it away from Harry. If that was the case, I'm sure Harry could've really used…" She sighed again and shook her head before rubbing her face on her hands. "As I said, no use crying over spilled milk. And I don't know about you, Izzy, but right now I need to close my eyes and give my brains a rest or else I'll lose my mind."

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "You're telling me you actually think you'll be able to sleep anything tonight?" She felt so bloody awake she doubted she'd bat an eye for days…

Ginny sighed. "If there's one thing you learn when you share a house with eight people, Izzy, is how to sleep no matter how crowded your mind is or how loud they are or how furious you are at them," she told her. "Or, well, at least I did."

"Well, good for you. I suppose I'll be staring at the ceiling all night, then," Izzy mumbled, slightly disappointed she'd have to go through a sure-to-be sleepless night on her own.

Her friend gave her a long look before suddenly standing up and walking over to her trunk. "Well, since you won't ask for it yourself," she said, opening the trunk and fetching something from inside it. "Here," she said, handing her what seemed to be a double scroll.

"Some light reading for the night," Izzy mumbled dryly. "Thanks."

"It's not for reading, idiot. It's for writing," Ginny told her, raising an eyebrow.

"Writ… is this papyrus?" Izzy asked as she unrolled a little of the scroll, finding herself looking at the blank parchment-like surface.

"Straight from Egypt," Ginny told her. "I thought George had told you about this."

Izzy looked up suddenly at the mention of her friend's brother. "George?" she asked, gulping a little.

"Yes. He told me to share it with you if you asked because he'd mentioned it at the station," Ginny explained. "I figured he'd at least explained what it was about… what the hell did you spend so long talking about, then?"

Izzy gulped and forced herself to look at the scroll instead of Ginny. Merlin knew her friend was just the sort of person who could take a fairly accurate conclusion out of the smallest thing… "This and that," she mumbled, thinking back to the conversation, first to the kiss they'd shared, to how close he'd stood and only then to the words spoken. "Wait," she said, suddenly being hit by realization. "Is _this_ the 'secret item'?"

"Secret item…" Ginny repeated before huffing in annoyance. "Figures he'd leave all the trouble of explaining further to me. As if… look, to put it short, you write on that scroll, the messages crosses to another one just like it that the twins have on them. No one intercepts it in between. It's safe and easy."

"So this is how you've been getting news from your family," Izzy mumbled, wondering how she'd never noticed Ginny using it before… on hindsight, she had, Izzy thought, recalling sometimes scribbling around while she used the time to survey the Carrows through the map.

"Yes," her friend confirmed. "And, before you ask, no, it isn't just like the Diary because I actually know who's on the other side. It's still sort of creepy but well…" she shrugged. "We aren't very rich on alternatives these days. So, anyway, grab your ink and your quill and go put your writing up to date downstairs, though you might want to wait until everyone's gone to bed to get it done since this thing is sort of a huge secret. Fred and George are night-owls so they'll probably be checking on it often. Be sure to tell them to soften Mum up for the letter that's bound to arrive. I'd rather be spared from the howler…"

Something in her friend's voice made Izzy feel like she was being ushered out. She wasn't sure why… maybe Ginny just wanted to be left alone… maybe she'd seen how odd her expression had turned upon realizing she could actually contact George and figured it all out. Either way, Izzy obeyed mostly for the sake of letting her friend have her alone time – something told her that, as much as Ginny preached about not crying over spilled milk, she might just be close to doing it herself. Failing to aid Harry wasn't something the redhead took lightly.

Minutes later, Izzy found herself standing in the newly-deserted common room, the fireplace still glistening in the background, holding a bunch of writing material, as well as an old-looking papyrus scroll.

She sat at the table farthest away from the portrait hole, willing to avoid the Dementor's extended influence radiating from the hallways leading to the Gryffindor tower, and started by unrolling the scroll of papyrus over the smooth wooden surface. For a while, she just stared at it.

So, from Ginny's explanation, she was just supposed to write and it would all materialize into another scroll miles and miles away. And, given Ginny had almost surely used it before somehow words would fade or else the surface wouldn't be completely blank. That, she thought, was a relief.

Sighing, she tapped on the table with her quill, trying to think of what to write. It wasn't easy, she supposed, writing to a bloke who, last time she'd seen him, had kissed her for whatever reason… Even worse, she suddenly thought – it was even harder writing to said bloke when she knew very well his bloody twin brother might be the one reading it. _Merlin, _she thought, eyeing the scroll and wondering for a moment if she shouldn't just resign herself to the boredom of insomnia…

_You'll just drive yourself mad, _a voice in her head said. _He's your friend – friends write to each other… and you don't really have the excuse of intercepted mail anymore with this, do you?_

She groaned. The voice – her own conscience – was right. She might as well just do it. She'd just write a letter. A friendly one, addressed to both Fred and George. She wouldn't mention the kiss, she wouldn't make it awkward. She'd just write trivialities and plead Ginny's case. That was enough. So, taking a deep breath, she dipped her quill into the ink bottle and started to write.

_Dear Fred and George, _she wrote on the rough surface before scratching her head, wondering what to write next.

_Apparently, Ginny decided to delegate on me – Izzy, in case you're wondering – the duty of filling you in with Hogwarts news tonight, _she continued, letting it flow as casually as possible. Before she could write anything else, though, she found herself staring at the scroll again.

_How very lazily cruel of her_, she suddenly read on the papyrus. The words were written on handwriting very different from her own so she was sure she hadn't, somehow, been possessed into writing there herself. All of a sudden, she could understand Ginny's mention of the diary, except that time she was fairly sure it was either Fred or George writing back. She surely hadn't expected any of them to write back so quickly – she wasn't sure how she felt about it, actually… She'd just been counting on writing a letter.

_Who is this? _She wrote.

_Well, I was going to say Amun, the dead Egyptian scribe who'd been murdered with the papyrus these scroll came from and had vowed to haunt everyone who dared write on the weapon that had stolen his life, but I guess Ginny ruined the surprise by feeding you too much information, _came the reply.

The whole plan brought a smile to her face. Yep, definitely one of the twins, Izzy concluded, although she could see either of them coming up with such an absurd story. _In her defense, _she wrote, _you ought to have shared your plan to haunt me with her_. _And since I can't actually see you at the moment, I'll just have to ask if I'm talking to Fred or to George._

_Now, why would I give away that information? _The unknown twin asked – she could perfectly imagine him chuckling madly on the other side. _Technically, that gives me all the leverage in this conversation. Maybe I'm Fred, maybe I'm George… or maybe I'm Gred or Forge… maybe I'm both. Or maybe I'm neither._

She huffed before rolling her eyes. _Well, you keep your leverage, then. I suppose I'll just keep my words to myself, _she wrote mostly for the sake of showing she wasn't any idiot. _Talking to faceless strangers… wouldn't want to get possessed or anything like Ginny did…_

He seemed to buy her bluff. _Merlin, Isabelle. Fine. I'll give you a hint._

Izzy smiled, knowing she wouldn't need it. He'd already give himself away by calling her by her full name. And, she had to admit, even though part of her had been dreading talking to him, she'd been hoping it would be George. Especially since, so far, they were just being… them. Not awkward. Not tense. Just Izzy and George. _I'm waiting, _she said, mostly for the sake of indulging him.

_Well, one of us – and by us, yes, I mean the most incredibly smart and successful joke-shop owners you'll ever meet – is upstairs in our flat, currently celebrating his girlfriend's belated birthday, so I'm pretty sure I'll be sleeping down here in the storeroom tonight because I don't want to hear them going at it all over the place, _George wrote.

Izzy snorted. _Poor you… I take it all is well with Fred and Angelina, then._

_Too well, _he replied. _What took you so long to get your hands on the scroll? I thought I'd been pretty tempting with the whole 'secret item' thing at the station._

She tensed a little at the mention of the station… From there to the kiss was just a little stretch. She hoped, really hoped, it wouldn't come up. Things were so… normal right then. She liked normal. She needed normal. _Well, Hogwarts has been taking up a lot of my time. Plus, you did imply it might burn my face off. _

_Didn't it?_

She snorted – of course he'd ask that. _I guess you'll have to wait and see for yourself next time we run into each other, _she replied. _But I've got to say, this thing is brilliant – did you and Fred charm it yourselves?_

_We wish, _he replied. _Bill gave us the scrolls years ago. He brought them back from Egypt for our birthday. We've been trying to copy the charm ever since but ours never make it through strong wards… We gave Ginny one of the originals and kept the other – figured she could use it to communicate with us from Hogwarts. Mum wouldn't have let her go otherwise. Anyway, what's keeping Ginny so busy that you'd have to fill in for her in our daily communications? Not, _he added quickly, _that I'm not glad to speak or, well, write to you._

Izzy sighed. _She was tired._

_Ginny? Tired? Are you sure we're referring to the same person? Small, spitfire redhead with an unstoppable demeanour. _

_Well, she does have a reason to be tired, today. And good for her – I, for one, was driven into insomnia by said reason._

The teasing ceased just like that. She didn't need to see him to know that if he'd been grinning before, as he always seemed to be, now he wasn't. _What happened?_

She hesitated for a moment. It annoyed her having to speak of that day's events again. And she doubted that would be the last time that week… or that month for that matter. But it was George. He was bound to find out soon enough. Plus, she thought, feeling rather dumb, how was she supposed to plead Ginny's case as her friend had asked if she didn't tell him about it? _We broke into Snape's office… and we got caught by him and the Carrows._

There was a long moment before he responded with only two words. _Merlin, Isabelle._

She sighed. _I know. _

_Are you alright? What did he do to you?_

_We're fine. He gave us detention with Hagrid at the Forest tomorrow. He thought it'd be full moon – probably expected us to be mauled by a warewolf over there or something. _

That time, he didn't respond for several seconds. It made her uneasy trying to picture what he was doing on the other side. Pacing around? Punching stuff? Laughing at their failure? _Are you there? _she asked.

_What did you have to get caught for? Wasn't that the one thing I asked you not to let happen? I thought you were good at this, Isabelle. Sneaking around, I mean…_

_I __am__ good at this! _She wrote. _But we got trapped! Snape's office had some weird wards that let us in but wouldn't let us out… We didn't know until it was too late_._ We never stood a chance._

_Merlin, Isabelle…_

Something in the way the words sounded in her head made her heart warm. Sure, she couldn't actually hear him or even see him for that matter… but she could tell he was concerned about her… them. About them, she corrected herself. George Weasley, eternal joker, was concerned. _It's okay – we're fine. They didn't really hurt us or anything_…_ McGonagall looked like she might. Which reminds me - I'm supposed to ask you to soften your Mum up for the letter she's bound to get about this whole thing. _

_Softening Mum up? There's no softening Mum up about something like this. If anything, I might intercept it, _George informed her. _But she's going to find eventually and then she'll take Ginny's hide and turn it into a coat._

_Lovely, _Izzy wrote dryly. _Just do what you can for as long as you can. McGonagall told us to report into her office tomorrow morning, so I don't think she'll send anything until after…_

_Oh, the morning call,_ George wrote like it was a big thing. _She did that to Fred and I hundreds of times. Not a good sign, let me tell you – means she's pissed off enough that she wants you to spend all night agonizing over what you did and intends to use that time to think of all the different sorts of punishment she can give you before being softened up by your side of the story._

_Great, _she sarcastically wrote with a groan.

_Relax, Isabelle, it's not that bad. Not when you have the chance to confer with dear old me, someone who happens to know every trick in the book in what comes to dealing with McGonagall's punishments._

_Because you've been through so many of them…_

_Proudly, _he assured her. _Anyway, show up really early. As in, straight after curfew's up early. And look completely miserable – like something just ate your puppy. She'll take that as regret. Don't bother with saying stuff like 'Snape had it coming' or anything because it won't work. Just stick with arriving early and looking like you haven't slept at all. You might just get away with a slap on the wrist… maybe a few weekends cleaning the loo. Little advice if you get that: smell-repelling charms. They're your friends, trust me._

Izzy sighed. _I suppose that fact that she thinks we broke into the office to prank Snape won't help, _she wrote.

_Didn't you? _He replied.

She hesitated for a moment. _For all intents and purposes. Ask me about that after this whole war thing is over. _

_Fine. I'll just add that to the list._

The list? she thought. Suddenly, it occurred to her that she'd told him a lot of stuff without really revealing much. She'd always tell him to ask her at a later time and he always went along with it. He'd never pressured her for the details she didn't want to give away. She supposed that was one of the reasons why talking to him was so easy, even before the whole 'crush' had come into play. Maybe that fact had even contributed into creating the crush in the first place.

_Enough of this, _Izzy wrote. _Tell me how things are on that side._

_Well, nothing too relevant. Plenty of order packing, some fits of crying from Mum every once in a while, all the logistics of setting up a pirate wireless station…_

_A pirate what now?_

That story served to fill another half hour of writing back and forth, which only stopped when, after a long pause, during which George took a while to write back, he suddenly announced he had to go because Lee Jordan had just shown up completely pissed on firewhiskey on his doorstep, sobbing about his girlfriend (the twin's usual cashier, Verity) who'd gone on the run a few weeks before.

_He's usually fine, especially when we're working on setting up the station, but when it gets him, it gets him, _George explained. _I should go and make sure he doesn't do anything stupid. We'll do this again tomorrow, okay?_

_I've got detention, _she reminded him.

_I meant after. I want to make sure you're not being digested by whatever creature devours you in the forest, _he informed her.

_Thank you so much for the picture,_ she wrote sarcastically.

_You're welcome,_ he replied – she could practically see him snickering around. _But I mean it, Isabelle. If you don't show up, I'm afraid I'll have to send a search party after you. You wouldn't want that, would you?_

_You're an idiot,_ she wrote.

_Gladly,_ he replied. _Good night, Isabelle._

She waited a few seconds before writing back. _Good night, George._

And, just as soon as she closed the scroll, promptly opening it back to make sure all evidence of their conversation was gone, Izzy found herself yawning, suddenly sleepy. She raised an eyebrow. Had he somehow cured her insomnia?

She shook her head a moment later. Of course he hadn't – he wasn't even _there. _The world just didn't work that way. _Silly girl, _she told herself. Silly girl with her crush.

* * *

They shared another odd little written conversation the next day, as promised, simply, she told herself, for the sake of him not fulfilling the promise of sending a rescue mission if she didn't send back a sign of life. Of course, she forced herself not to overthink the fact that the conversation had extended far beyond her detailing their adventures in the forest and informing him that they were, indeed, in loo-cleaning duty for the whole month's Saturdays, courtesy of McGonagall…

She made a point of giving herself a series of made up excuses to justify the fact that two days later, than again four and then again seven, she found herself talking to him again. By the time, maybe a couple of weeks later, she realized they'd been writing to each other every other day, she gave up on giving herself excuses.

She was also thankful that she and Ginny had long ago given each other free reign to go through the other's things as much as they wanted without having to ask, or else she was sure her friend would've had quite an amount of questions as to why she so often asked to borrow a scroll of Papyrus that only served to communicate with her brothers – questions Izzy didn't want to answer. Still, she had to wonder if her friend had noticed as, without explanation, she'd started sending her daily updates to her family in the morning instead of at night, when Izzy and George usually spoke… or rather wrote. Either way, Ginny never brought up the matter, not even when Izzy started borrowing her writing ink ridiculously often as she kept running out of hers thanks to the long written conversations with George – she did, however, get a box of never-ending self-inking quills from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes in mid-November as an 'early birthday present' even though her birthday was more than a month away. It was hard not to wonder if Ginny hadn't set George up to that.

They'd talk about everything and nothing and never get bored of it even though sometimes those conversations would last for over an hour. Their kiss, she couldn't help noticing, wasn't mentioned once and she didn't dare bringing it up and potentially ruining that comfortable friendship they were cultivating.

She'd tell him about what went on in the school, mostly the DA-related parts, and, in worse days, she'd allow herself to tell him about the fears she couldn't bring herself to share with Ginny or Neville since they were all in the same boat. In return, he'd tell her she was going to be fine, while constantly filling her in the things that went on at the shop and in the Order, always in laugh-filled narrations. She especially liked George's account of Tonks's hormonal antics and bizarre behaviours ("_She ate a strawberry jam and broccoli sandwich! In front of us! That was wrong in so many levels!")_, as well as his detailed tales concerning the set-up of their yet-to-be-aired pirate station, namely one occasion when Lee Jordan had nearly been strangled to death by some cord he'd tried to charm while putting the equipment together ("_He was never in any actual danger… although his lips were turning sort of blue.")_. She was sure if someone walked in on her during one of their writing back and forth sessions, she'd be locked up as insane over randomly laughing like no one seemed to do these days.

As November passed and the snow-covered December arrived, George started to drop hints about some surprise her father was setting up for her and her mum but, as much as she begged and insisted that she hated surprises (just for the sake of getting him to blab) he'd never cave and tell her, instead repeatedly saying that she just had to wait and see. Somehow, she got the feeling that he might be part of the surprise as well, or else he probably wouldn't be so determined to keep her in the dark.

It wasn't until the 15th day of December, her birthday, on which George left her an earlier than usual message consisting of a really messy drawing of a birthday cake (she could safely say her two-year-old brother was better at drawing than him) with sixteen candles on it and a very apologetic message saying that Kingsley had scheduled a last-minute Order meeting for that night, meaning he likely wouldn't be able to talk to her that day, that she actually grasped though her disappointment the fact that those days she spent a great deal of her time (a _very_ great deal) looking forward to those little stolen moments with George, even if they were still miles apart… And when, about ten minutes before midnight, he ended up surprising her with another message (while she was finishing a late charms assignment and still obsessing over the damn scroll of papyrus), she found herself smiling until her face physically hurt.

She'd only notice days later how, that one time, she hadn't been so quick to dismiss those feelings as the deliriums of a silly teenage girl with a crush. And then she found herself wondering if she wasn't in fact more than that…

**A/N2: So, I guess I don't need to add anything to this last part except... surprise! I hope you liked the chapter. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	55. The Way Home

**A/N: Happy Easter, everyone! And for Easter you get... an almost Christmas chapter. Weird, I know. This one is slightly smalled than the previous ones (finally!) mostly because I transplanted a bunch of scenes to the next chapter which: a) good news, it's about half writen; b) bad news, it's on paper... yes, that kind of paper where you write with a pen because your laptop was sent away to be fixed and _someone _who I happen to have named a main character over is too worried about status updates and chatting with her friends to let me borrow hers... Anyway, enjoy!**

**23 December 1997**

The morning the Hogwarts Express was set to leave for London with all the students planning to spend their Christmases with their families, they were all round up like cattle at the Hogsmeade train station as the Carrows personally lectured them on the consequences of not returning. And by 'lectured', Izzy actually meant 'intimidated'. And by 'intimidated', she meant them doing so in the most colourful ways possible, with extensive descriptions of just how great their parents would feel when Dementors sucked their souls or how they'd hang upside down for weeks (to be honest, Izzy was pretty sure that would kill them before they reached the day barrier but she supposed that would only make the Carrows happier…).

All in all, it was a pretty miserable beginning to such a promising day and it sure didn't help that it was freezing to the point of everyone's breath creating a fog in the general area where they stood ankle-deep in snow. Of course, that sort of cold was rather comfortable as opposed to the sort they'd feel if they ever came to experience the detailed descriptions the Carrows were filling their minds with.

Her mother stood near the train, between Flitwick and Slughorn (who appeared to be riding with them to London), eyeing the Death Eater siblings with the utmost disgust. She did, however, take turns on checking if she and Ginny were still on their places among the Gryffindors, as if she was sure something bad was going to happen before they could get home again… In times like those, one always seemed to be suspicious when normalcy – or as close as they could get to it – was just at an arm's length.

She yawned as Alecto got started on the equally tragic consequences of failing to present her holiday assignment of writing an essay describing ten reasons why Muggles should be 'put in their place' (and by that Izzy was fairly sure Alecto meant 'round up and decimated'), not because she was bored (despite knowing she didn't have enough fingers in one hand to count the times they'd heard that speech over and over again...) but because she hadn't slept more than six hours the previous night for reasons she wouldn't allow herself to over think…

Thankfully, before they could freeze to death, Snape showed up, looking quite annoyed, and pulled the Carrows aside, 'whispering' – certainly loud enough for plenty of people to ready – about how the Hogwarts Express had a schedule to keep up with, something they were making quite hard thanks to their 'lack of skills on synthesizing a simple matter'.

"_What are you idiots doing still standing there? Get into the blasted train!_" Amycus shouted hotly at the students after having spent what had to be over a minute regarding the headmaster with mad I'll-kill-you-one-day-oh-yes-I-will eyes – a look that Snape merely reacted to by turning his back on him and walking away in a rather defying manner.

As he did so, though, Izzy didn't miss the frown followed by a disapproving look the man gave her and Ginny as his eyes happened to meet hers. She supposed she should be used to that by now, as he'd grimaced basically every time he'd seen her since she was ten for the simple fact that her father was… well, her father. Of course, it was hard to ignore that the grimace had only become more intense after having been caught in his office, which she supposed might not only have something to do with the invasion itself but also with the fact that she, along with Ginny, Neville and Luna had ended up not serving as werewolf kibble during their detention – no doubt a source of endless disappointment to the old Potions Master…

"Not this carriage – this one if for the Ravenclaws," Alecto announced, stopping her and Ginny as the two of them tried to get into one of the train's cars.

"What? We're separated by houses now?" Izzy protested, eyeing the woman in disbelief.

"Yes."

"Brilliant," Ginny replied sarcastically. "What's next? Blood status?"

"Do you have a problem with that, Miss Weasley?" the Death Eater replied, glaring.

"As a matter of fact I d…"

They heard the sound of a throat being cleared behind them before Ginny was able to finish, which had them turning around, only to find themselves facing McGonagall. "Miss Weasley, Miss Black, you might want to get out of the way – you're making a line," the Transfiguration teacher informed them, nodding at the queue of annoyed Ravenclaws that had formed behind them, Luna among them, although she seemed far less bothered.

"Sorry," Izzy mumbled as she and Ginny stepped away, the redhead's eyes still glaring at Alecto's. "We'll see you at King's Cross, Luna," she told their friend, who nodded.

"Have a nice journey," she wished them, a faint smile on her face despite the fact that being separated from Izzy, Ginny and even Neville, meant she would likely go through the whole train ride on her own. Maybe someone from the DA would keep her company, Izzy mused, even though she knew most people she found her friend far too odd to spend time with outside of meetings.

"Come along. I'll walk you to the Gryffindor carriage," McGonagall urged them eyeing Alecto in a rather stern manner. "You know, Miss Weasley, you might want to think hard on how you express your opinions to certain people in this school," the old teacher told Ginny as soon as they were out of the Death Eater's earshot.

"But this whole thing is ridiculous! I mean, separating the houses during the train ride? What's the point?" she asked as they followed the older woman, luggage in a tow.

"There isn't one. At least aside from showing that they're in charge – honestly, there are far worse ways to accomplish that, Miss Weasley. I'd say we ought not to complain too much while things still are at this level," McGonagall stated. "I believe I have already stressed to you how difficult they can make our lives. If that hasn't stuck, I'm afraid the lecture and the detention I gave you last month wasn't enough."

Izzy gulped. Oh, it had been enough – she could only say she owed George endlessly for his smell-repelling charm tip… "It stuck, Professor. It couldn't have possibly stuck any better," she assured the woman.

"I very much hope so," she informed them. "Well, this is your carriage. I will be staying in the first compartment, so if you need anything during the journey…"

"Wait, aren't you from Scotland?" Izzy asked without thinking. "Er… I mean, if you're going home for Christmas, what is the point of taking the train to London only to come back?"

McGonagall's eyebrows raised before she allowed her lips to curl slightly. "Christmas shopping. There's no place like London to do it. Also, I haven't travelled in the Hogwarts Express in quite a few decades – this seemed like a good time to do so again."

Translation: she wanted to keep an eye on the students as well. That was obvious enough for Izzy – after all, Diagon Alley was practically a ghost town these days according to George. Unless she was planning to do all her shopping on Muggle London, there was just no point going all the way to London to stock up for Christmas. Especially two days before Christmas.

"Well? Go on in, girls – the train can't stay on the platform forever," the teacher urged them.

They carried their luggage inside and were thankful to note that, due to some sort of catfight between Romilda Vane and one of her 'frenemies' – Merlin knew she had quite a lot of those – at the opposite end of the carriage, most people were too busy watching it, laughing and whistling to occupy the empty compartments, which left plenty for Ginny and Izzy to choose from. They ended up in the compartment right next to McGonagall's just in case, knowing Mia would most likely join her in there.

And, not surprisingly, less than a minute had passed since they'd entered the compartment when they heard Izzy's mother's voice outside scolding someone – likely Romilda – and promising detention before their compartment's door slid open and she stepped in, huffing.

"Here, let me give you a hand with that," Mia offered as she saw Ginny struggling with placing her heavy trunk on the overhead shelf.

"Thanks," Ginny said as the woman levitated the trunk onto its place.

Mia shook her head. "Don't mention it. Listen, girls, I don't have a lot of time here before I have to go back to my own carriage. I…"

"Wait, you're not staying with McGonagal?" Izzy asked in surprise.

Her mother shook her head one more time. "Every carriage was assigned a teacher to keep an eye on it throughout the whole journey. I was assigned to the Hufflepuff carriage as Professor Sprout is ill." They had, she knew, done it on purpose – Minerva had signed up to replace Sprout on the trip as soon as she'd heard the other woman had come down with the flu. Alecto, however, had been quick to point out that, as head of Gryffindor, McGonagall should be in charge of the Gryffindors, while Mia – just a common teacher – could be left to handle the Hufflepuffs. She was sure it wasn't a coincidence that their carriage just happened to be the farthest one away from the Gryffindors – they wanted to keep her on her toes, wondering what was going on with her kid on the other end of the train, which, sure, she couldn't help doing, but not as much as if McGonagall wasn't around to watch Izzy. "Don't worry about that," she told them. "Do you know where Minerva will be staying?"

Ginny nodded. "Sure. Just next door."

"Then listen – if anything happens, don't go looking for me. Go to Minerva instead and use your wands. I'll be fine."

"But Mum…" Izzy stated to protest.

"Not buts, Izzy. Just do it. And when we arrive in London, don't leave the carriage until I come to get you. Or your dad does. And don't go with either of us unless you're sure it's really us – test us, alright?"

"Mum, this is the Hogwarts Express, not a battlefield," Izzy told her mother.

"Better safe than sorry," she replied. "And this also applies to you, Ginny," she said, turning to the redhead. "No heroics. No leaving without me, Sirius, your parents or maybe your brothers, depending on who comes to get you, alright? Always make sure it's them."

Ginny nodded. "We will. But there's not really much trouble we can actually get into with McGonagall just a compartment away."

"Ginny's got a point," Izzy told her mother. "We'll be fine. Relax. We'll be home in a few hours, being teased by Dad and ran into the ground by Alex and Mary. Just think there's that."

Mia sighed, her lips curling a little. "Yeah, there's that," she agreed, reaching to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her daughter's ear. "You look tired, honey – you might want to catch up with your sleep during the trip."

Izzy huffed. "I'd already be doing so if the Carrows hadn't kept us out so long giving us nightmare material."

Mia let out a sigh, shaking her head. "Don't mind them, honey. Alright, you girls have a nice trip. Remember…"

"We _do_," Izzy replied before her mother could finish. "We'll be fine on our own, Mum. _Go._"

She did, but only when she saw Minerva McGonagall stepping into the carriage, taking the opportunity to have a word with her.

Left finally alone in the compartment with Ginny, Izzy removed her cloak and slumped onto her seat as her friend glanced out the window, watching as Amycus all but dragged a terrified first-year Ravenclaw into the carriage next to theirs – the kid had probably done nothing more than mistakenly taking a seat in one of the other houses' cars, yet the bastard made it seem like he was hauling around a criminal of the worst sort. How sadly ironic. "Do you reckon those two were born this way? Amycus and Alecto? All rotten and sadistic? I find it very hard to picture them as anything close to children," Ginny observed.

Izzy tried to picture that for a moment. "Odd… the only thing I _can_ picture them as, other than what they are now, is a two-headed snake that feeds on people's misery."

"Now _that_ I can see," Ginny agreed, taking a seat opposite her friend. "Merlin, they just won't stop rolling when it comes to power trips and threats, will they?"

"Guess it's all they've got to show they're in charge. I hate Snape's guts but I've got to hand it to him – he hasn't been making things easy for the twisted twins," Izzy offered. "And I don't think he even cares that one of these days those two could snap and murder him in his sleep for it."

"Which ironically wouldn't be good for us since his pride is the biggest wall between us and the Carrows," Ginny mumbled with a sigh. "Blimey, it looks gloomy no matter the way you look at it."

Izzy groaned, stuffing her cloak into a pillow, which placed between her head and the window as she rested her head on it. "For now, I'll just hope that gloominess doesn't spread into my dreams," she mumbled, closing her eyes.

Ginny gaped at her. "What? You're taking a nap already?"

"You heard my mum – I look tired."

"It's barely nine in the bloody morning!" Ginny protested, annoyed that, with her friend asleep, she'd be left to either die of boredom or – Merlin, she really didn't want to do that – get started on Alecto's disgusting essay, which she'd already decided to bomb by writing the very opposite she wanted.

"Funny. Feels much earlier in my mind," Izzy mumbled in response.

The redhead's eyed her oddly before raising an eyebrow. "Do you really want to get there?"

"Get where?"

Ginny gave her a look that basically said something along the lines of 'oh, so you want to play that game?' "To the point of this conversation when I have to point out the fact that the reason why it feels so early in your mind is because you haven't gone to bed before midnight in weeks thanks to those – what should I call them? – 'late-night conversations' with a certain brother of mine."

Izzy's eyes snapped open a moment before she froze, just staring at her friend for several seconds in horror. She couldn't deny it – Ginny would crush her like a bug if she tried. Plus, lying to her best friend's face was just a bad idea in so many ways… "I was hoping you hadn't noticed that…" she lamely declared.

"Well, I might have not if I was… I dunno, brain damaged?" Ginny asked, looking slightly insulted. "Just how thick do you think I am?"

"I don't think you're thick. I just…" she paused, sighing. "I just I don't want to talk about it, okay?" She had more than enough confusion in her mind without her best friend adding more to it…

"I know. That's why I haven't brought it up before," Ginny told her, taking a seat opposite her. "Even though it does make you wonder a lot when your best friend spends hours and hours at a time writing back and forth to your brother – who I have and will remain assuming is the girlfriendless one out of the twins, by the way – when up until a few weeks you thought they were just friends."

"We _are_ just friends," Izzy insisted.

"Just friends? Really? You spend hours writing back and forth nearly every night and on the nights you don't, you just pace around aimlessly like a headless chicken. If _that _is your notion of 'just friends', I guess you and I are little more than acquaintances, hum?" Ginny replied, raising her eyebrows further.

"Look, it's… it's complicated, Ginny. It just…" she pulled her pillow-shaped cloak onto her lap and sighed. "He's a really good friend. The kind of good friend that I don't want to lose by making a crush anything more than it is." She stunned herself for a moment over even admitting the crush out loud. What on Earth was going on with her head? True, by then she was pretty sure Ginny was already up to it, but still. _It is done, _she told herself. _Deal with it. _"So, please, Ginny," she continued, "just let me leave it there because if we get talking about it, I'll start over thinking, and then things will get weird and I don't want them weird because they way they are now… they give me something to look forward every day, alright?"

The redhead gaped at her for what had to be a full minute. She had it bad. Her friend had so, so bad and she was fighting tooth and nail _not _to see it. And to be honest, Ginny couldn't really blame her because, ever since she'd first lent her the scroll of papyrus, Izzy had started looking much more… joyful. Happy. Almost immune to all the crap the Carrows pulled all around them. It seemed pretty reasonable Izzy wouldn't want to end the source of that feeling by taking a step she clearly wasn't even ready to consider. Merlin knew she'd taken her sweet time dancing around her crush on Harry long before making any actual move on him – and all through that time, Izzy had been around offering a listening ear when she needed it and space when she didn't. She supposed it was time she extended the same courtesy to her friend since it had worked out pretty well for her. "Alright," she conceded. "Because it's Christmas in two days and I'm pretty sure I won't be able to get you anything else, you can consider me letting this conversation be delayed indefinitely your Christmas present."

Izzy sighed, slumping back against her seat. "Thank you," she told her, feeling incredibly relieved. She knew most people would think she was stupid or a coward for choosing to fully ignore the confusing realizations she'd been getting for the past few weeks. She felt stupid. She felt like a coward. But she refused to change her mind anyway because the thought of risking that comfortable relationship she and George had reached was too unbearable to even consider. All she knew was that she spent most of her time looking forward to when she'd talk to him next and the thought of screwing that up… well, she could just simplify it by pointing out how frustrated she currently was by the fact that she knew that night they wouldn't be able to do their thing, not only because the scroll would be heading to the Burrow with Ginny but also because she knew George would be up late doing inventory with Remus and Fred before the shop was set to close its doors on a more permanent basis from Christmas Eve's afternoon on.

"You're welcome. I do, however, have to make a statement on this matter," Ginny added all of a sudden.

"Ugh… Please don't," Izzy begged.

"Sorry – this one I really have to," Ginny told her. "Remember roughly five years ago when we entered our first year and I had a massive crush on a certain boy? A certain boy who happened to be as good as your brother and, therefore, an unspeakable topic between us in my simple first-year-mind? And do you remember how that got me writing on a cursed diary that eventually possessed me and how the crush and the possession got so bad that I could barely say a word said boy's way, which got you thinking that I believed he was the heir of Slytherin, which led to you refusing to even be in the same room as me except for sleeping because you 'weren't friends with traitors'?"

Izzy felt awful just thinking back to it. That had, without a doubt, been their friendship's darkest year… "Ginny, I am so, so…"

Ginny waved it away. "Water under the bridge – I've told you that a hundred times. Anyway, I'm not bringing it up to make you feel bad – I'm just trying to make a point, so here it is: remember how me thinking I couldn't talk to you about my crush on your brother nearly got me killed? Don't do the same. I don't want you to think that because the guy in question happens to be closely related to me, you have to keep it quiet. We can still talk… within reason, of course – as in don't tell me anything you wouldn't want to hear about Harry. And speaking of Harry, don't use him as an excuse either. Just because I don't get to be with him right now, it doesn't mean I want everyone around me to all of a sudden shut down their feelings and be as miserab…" She stopped herself, shaking her head. "Anyway, you get my point, don't you? Tell me stuff, even it's about stupid George. If not now, then when you feel like it."

Izzy smiled a little at her friend.

"Of course," Ginny continued. "If it's actually Fred you've been writing to, I'd seriously advise you to watch your step because Angelina is one of those primal-rage sort of girls. Plus, it's not just her wand you have to worry about. Her dad's a Muggle and he works for some special police – Scotland something… Anyway, that means she's got one of those things that plucks holes into people under her roof. Crap, I keep forgetting the name even though it's really easy… let me think… I had a mnemonic for this for our Muggle Studies OWL last year. It rhymes with something ironic in that case… calm… no, not calm… peace, maybe? Nah… fun… _It's no fun getting shot by a gun_. Gun. She'll shoot you with a gun if it's Fred you have the hots for."

"I don't have the hots for anyone," Izzy protested, feeling her face heat. "And _if _I did, it wouldn't be _Fred_."

"Good. Because Angelina _would_ kill you," Ginny told her.

"Lovely. Now, can I have my nap, please?" she asked dryly.

"Aw, come on! What am I supposed to do while you sleep? Stare at the ceiling?" the redhead complained.

"If you feel like it. Or you could enjoy the landscape," Izzy suggested, pointing at the moving scenery behind the window's glass before starting to make herself comfortable.

"Oh, lovely. The landscape," Ginny replied sarcastically. "Oh, look, a pile of snow. And over there… what is that? _Another _pile of snow."

Izzy groaned, trying to ignore her just as the door of their compartment unexpectedly slid. Both of them turned to it rather alarmed for a second before they found Neville stepping in. "Oh, thank Merlin," she mumbled before turning to Ginny. "See? You have someone to entertain you now. Now, can I sleep in peace, please?"

"Fine. Sleep away," Ginny conceded before turning to Neville. "See this? My own best friend would rather spend the whole bloody trip napping than keeping me entertained."

"She's probably just tired," Neville offered diplomatically, prompting Izzy to mumble something that sounded somewhat like 'I am' against her makeshift cloak-pillow. "You girls mind if I stay here?"

"Like you need to ask, Neville," Ginny replied, rolling her eyes. "Where have you been until now, anyway? We've left the station like ten minutes ago."

"Er… I was sitting with Saemus, Lavender and Parvati but then, well, Parvati took some potion for the flu that made her all drowsy to the point that she fell asleep and Seamus started flirting really badly with Lavender… I figured I might want to make a run for it before things got to… er… too heated."

"Merlin, you don't think they'd snog all over the place with Parvati sleeping five feet away, do you?" Ginny couldn't help asking.

"Yuck," Izzy muttered, her eyes already closed, to which Ginny replied by demanding she shut up and sleep.

She didn't take very long to comply to her friend's orders as Ginny's and Neville's voices started to fade, popping into her head perhaps once or twice during what, she'd later imagine, were slight moments of awareness. By the time she did fully wake up, she was being shaken by Ginny and the lights were on inside the train, at the same time it looked quite dark outside.

"Wha…?" she mumbled, slightly confused she looked around, her vision blurred.

"Wake up – the conductor said we'll be there in about five minutes," Ginny told her.

"Already?" she asked.

"You've slept for nearly eight hours in a row," Neville informed her. "We tried to wake you around lunch-time but… er…"

"You _growled_ at me," Ginny pointed out. "I'm pretty sure you'd have bitten me if I'd insisted more than I did. What the hell were you dreaming off, anyway? Dogfights in which you were the dog?"

"I don't remember," she mumbled. "I really slept that long?"

"Yes. You didn't miss much, though, so don't worry. McGonagall popped by, as did Seamus and Lavender at some point. We stopped for like a minute somewhere near Glasgow but just kept on going from then on."

"Parvati slept practically through the whole trip too," Neville offered.

"Because she was basically in a potion-induced stupor," Ginny couldn't help adding. "On a more positive note, you didn't drool, snore or talk on your sleep. Pity. You do have pillow marks all over your face, though."

"What?" Izzy asked in alarm, trying to see her reflection on the window. "Oh, I can see the station," she announced as she started spotting parked trains at a distance, instantly forgetting about the pillow marks. Home was but a handful of yards away…

"Do you want to go wait outside on the aisle before everyone starts crowding it?" Neville asked them.

Ginny gave him an apologetic look. "We promised Izzy's Mum we'd wait for her to get us. You should do it, though. I'm sure your gran is looking forward to seeing you."

He smiled a little. "Yeah. I've missed her too. Well, I'd better go fetch my trunk from Seamus' compartment. You girls have a nice Christmas," he told them as he got up and moved towards the door.

"You too, Neville," Izzy replied, glancing away from the window for a moment in order to offer him a smile.

"We'll see you in January," Ginny added as the older boy stepped out of their compartment, leaving the door closed behind him.

Soon, as Neville predicted, students crammed the hallway outside even before the train showed signs of stopping, loudly wishing each other a nice holiday, as well as discussing their plans for the break, rarely beyond enjoying time with their families. As the voices outside grew louder and louder with more people joining in, Izzy and Ginny used the time to fetch their luggage from the overhead shelves and ready themselves to leave.

There was an odd sort of cheer from the students when the train finally entered the platform, followed by most of them making a run for the exits like the train was cursed or something. At some point as she peaked out of the compartment, Izzy was pretty sure she'd seen someone taking a bizarre, likely unintended flight out the carriage's door, all was the hurry of the crowd. That and the bruises they were bound to get from bumping into trunks and other people's legs was bound to hurt on the following day.

By the time she spotted her mother making her way out of the gangway connection, the carriage was practically empty, with only a couple of first years who'd likely failed to wake up before all the mess had started taking place stumbling their way out of the train.

"You ready?" Mia asked.

Izzy nodded as she pulled her trunk onto the aisle, allowing Ginny to step out herself. "So, about those security questions…" she started saying, looking at her mother.

"You and Harry used to steal Lulu's broomstick all the time. You liked to believe we didn't know it but we obviously did," Mia offered, knowing that was something hardly anyone but her could know.

"In our defence, I'm pretty sure Lulu wanted us to. The cupboard was always suspiciously unlocked," Izzy replied.

Mia sighed. Honestly, that wouldn't really surprise her – Lulu had always had a rather unorthodox approach to child-minding. "So, did you girls have a nice journey?" she asked them both, changing the subject.

"It was alright," Ginny responded. "Though I can't speak for Izzy since she slept through the _whole_ journey," she pointed out, sending an annoyed look her friend's way.

"The whole journey? You didn't even wake up for lunch?" Mia asked, prompting her daughter to respond by shaking her head. "Merlin, you must be starving," she said, eyeing Izzy with some concern.

She was starving, Izzy had to admit. "It's okay. We're almost home, anyway. Kreacher will be more than happy to feed me."

Her mother couldn't help letting her lips curl for a moment at the mention of home being so close. "Well, lead the way, then," she told the girls, peaking out of the window to check on the crowd outside before letting them step out ahead of her.

Ginny was the first one out, immediately followed by Izzy and then an ever-watchful Mia. The platform seemed different somehow, Izzy noted. Darker. Colder. Even more so than it had been in September.

There was still too many people crowding the area immediately outside the train, not allowing them to spot anyone they knew, such as her father or the Weasleys.

"Just keep heading to the back of the crowd," her mother instructed them as she followed them with her eyes darting everywhere. "It will be easier to spot anyone from outside the crowd."

They did as she said, making way through the large agglomerates of people who didn't seem to gather that they were blocking the way from everyone else. Crowds always annoyed her, Izzy thought just a moment before she managed to reach the back and, without a warning, felt herself being grabbed by the arm.

Alarmed, she felt herself panicking for a second before her other arm started to reach for her wand. When she saw who it was, though, she immediately stopped. "Daddy!" she found herself shouting before practically launching herself into her father's arms.

Grinning like – he was sure – he hadn't grinned in months, Sirius held his oldest daughter back, even lifting her from the floor at one point. "You are in big trouble, Izzybel," he found himself telling her rather half-heartedly.

Izzy raised her eyebrows as he put her back down on the floor and took a small step back. "_You_ are in big trouble – nearly gave me a heart attack when you grabbed me!" she replied, trying to turn the tables

"You call that a reason for a heart attack? A heart attack is what I nearly had when your mother told me my firstborn had been caught – _caught_ – sneaking into a certain slimy bastard's office by no less than our three favourite people in Hogwarts. All _three _of them!" he replied, glaring a little.

It occurred to Izzy only at that moment that she'd skipped the security question part, although by then she was as sure as one could possibly be that the person in front of her was her father. Between using his own special nickname for her and showing more outrage at her having been caught than at her sneaking into Snape's office in the first place, there was simply no way anyone would have found such a good Sirius Black impersonator. "You've already made your outrage known plenty of times, Daddy," Izzy pointed out, recalling all those conversations via two-way mirror. "And I've already pointed out the fact that you wouldn't have done any better. Even in your prime."

He gave her a look of complete indignation. "I _am _in my prime! And as for expressing my outrage, well, it's far more effective when done in person, little Miss Not-So-Stealthy. Which," he added, turning to Ginny, "I suppose is a nickname also applies to you, Miss Not-So-Stealthy, special redheaded edition."

Ginny raised her eyebrows. "I have no regrets aside from all the toilets we had to clean afterwards," she simply said. "Anyway, have you seen my parents anywhere?"

"Oh, actually, you're coming with us today," he announced, just a second before Ginny's face shifted from mild nervousness to absolute panic. "Calm down, calm down! Your parents are just fine. Everything is fine – this is just part of an arrangement we have. Nothing bad about it."

"And what sort of arrangement is that?" Izzy inquired, raising an eyebrow.

"That's for me to know and you to find out," he replied. "I believe the street word for it is 'surprise'. You may want to watch and learn from it since it requires a certain level of sneakiness you don't seem to have."

"I'll give you the sneakiness," Izzy mumbled, glaring and prompting her father to glare back in amusement. So that was it. _The _surprise George had so often tortured her with and of which she hadn't been able to gather any information aside from it being related to her father and, somehow, the Weasleys. Damn him. Izzy liked to believe that, had they been talking face-to-face, George would have coughed it up ten minutes in – persuasive powers just didn't have the same effect via charmed papyrus…

"Hi," she suddenly heard her mother saying in a slightly shaky voice.

Her father looked up immediately, from her to her mother and then, as Sirius replied in the same bizarrely shy manner and they smiled softly at each other, Izzy couldn't help but feeling like a bunch of things were all happening at the same time: the sun was rising, the moon was gleaming at full power and a wave of falling stars was tracing the sky. None of those things might actually be taking place in the real world but they sure were in her parents' heads as the whole platform seemed to warm up when Sirius and Mia Black stepped back into each other's arms. There was just something… right about it.

As their daughter turned her back on them, maybe to give them a little privacy or maybe just to comment something with Ginny, Sirius simply held his wife close as if having her back was too good to be true.

"I missed you so much," he heard her whispering against his shoulder.

He sighed. "I missed you too," he replied before placing a small kiss on her lips, mindful of the presence of a few hundred students of hers nearby, as well as McGonagall only a few yards away – he had to wonder if the look the older woman had shot his way upon leaving the train had been warning him about his public displays of affection. Probably not, but still he chose to save the good stuff for later – Izzy would kill him if he embarrassed her in front of her classmates, anyway. "I can't believe I haven't kissed you in more than three months."

Mia chuckled. "That must have been painful for you," she replied, a smile playing on her lips.

"It was," he confirmed. "It physically hurt."

She kissed his cheek. "There," she whispered. "We'll take care of that later. How are my babies?"

"They're good. Excited to see Mummy. I imagine Molly will have a hard time keep them under control – Alex was particularly jumpy," he told her.

Mia raised an eyebrow. "Molly?"

He nodded. "I bit of a surprise I put together."

"A surprise?"

"Well, I suppose I _could _tell _you_," he offered before proceeding to give her a short account of running into Arthur in the twins' shop a few weeks ago and the other man mentioning something about Molly feeling rather low (apparently she hadn't even started decorating the house for the season, an alarming sign since she usually did around November). So, upon Sirius mentioning that Christmas spirit wasn't very high on him either, one thing had led to another and they'd ended up concluding that they might be able to salvage a little holiday cheer if they all celebrated it together. "So, long story short, the Weasleys are spending Christmas in our home," he explained. "I hope you don't mind – it's just until Boxing Day, really. Plus, it's not _all _of them, anyway. Muriel is – thank Merlin – refusing to leave her house and Bill and Fleur want to spend their first Christmas as a married couple snuggling alone at home like the newlyweds they are. The twins won't be joining us until tomorrow either, so… I figured that together we'd do a good job out of getting through Christmas without H…"

Mia stopped him with a kiss, to which he replied almost immediately, even though, still mindful of McGonagall's presence nearby, he kept it quick. "Thank you," she said. "It's perfect." She couldn't honestly say she hadn't spent her own share of sleepless nights wondering about Harry, thinking that would be the first time in sixteen years she wouldn't spend Christmas with him around. And Molly, she knew, would be feeling exactly the same about Ron. Maybe that hadn't been the first thing in her mind but Molly might just be exactly who she needed around to get through it – they were on the same boat, after all. It made sense they would do a better job sailing it together than apart.

"You're welcome, love," Sirius said with a smile before stepping back, shifting to keep one arm around her back as he turned to Izzy and Ginny as they appeared to search the crowd for something. "Ladies," he said. "It's safe to turn around."

"Have you seen Luna?" Izzy asked her father as she did so. "We'd talked about meeting her here to wish her a Happy Christmas…"

Sirius shook his head. "No. I did see her father, though. He was standing at the end of the platform about ten minutes ago." He glanced on that direction only to see Xenophilius wasn't there anymore. "Apparently, he's already gone. To be honest, he probably just scooped her up as soon as he saw her and took her home, which is what I should be doing. This is no place to stand around anymore, unfortunately."

Mia nodded. "I'm sure she won't mind if you just write to her. You'll see her in a little more than a week."

Ginny ended up shrugging. "I guess."

"So, we're going home now?" Izzy asked, her lips curling.

Her father gave her a nod. "Home it is."

**A/N2: Not much to add to what I said before, so... Happy Easter. Loads of chocolate eggs and all :D Feedback is welcome, as always! Review!**


	56. Christmas Eve

**A/N: And just when I thought chapters were going back to a normal length, I find myself writing one for the top ten of longest chapters... **

**24 December 1997**

"Have I told you yet how much I missed having you here at home with me?" Mia heard her husband whispering into her ear, his arm wrapping itself around her middle as she stood in front of the wardrobe, finishing getting dressed on Christmas Eve's morning. "Because I did," he murmured against her neck. "I did a lot."

"So I've heard," she replied, an easy smile playing on her lips. "At least once every hour since I arrived yesterday… Well, except for those nine we spent sleeping."

Sirius groaned against her neck. "Nine hours in a row. _Nine_. I haven't slept that long while the kids were in the house for the past three months," he said. "Bless Molly Weasley and her desperate need to mother any kid within reach."

Mia sighed, turning around and wrapping her arms around her husband's neck. "I'm sorry you had to deal with them on your own this whole time," she said.

Sirius shook his head. "Don't be." He meant it – he didn't want her to be sorry. Not her. Because no matter how sleep-deprived, frustrated or stressed he'd been for the past three months while looking after two of their kids without her, it was nothing compared to the thirteen she'd spent doing the same without him. Besides, looking after the little ones had become far more than a duty… "Although I may contradict this in the future once those two get to robbing me of my sleep all over again," he told her, "they're worth every single frustratingly restless hour. They keep me sane by driving me insane," he stated. "Does that make sense?"

"They're a better reason for you to lose your mind over than the war," she provided.

He smiled. "See? I miss this."

"What?"

Sirius shrugged. "Just this. You knowing me so well. Us," he provided. "But do you know what I missed even more?" he asked, not giving her a chance to answer before he captured her lips into a fiery kiss, that kind that was really just possible after a long time of forced abstinence. "This," he mumbled before moving to her jaw, starting a descending path towards her neck. "And this."

"Sirius," his wife whispered, barely managing to keep her mind clear enough to present any shred of good sense. "We really need to get downstairs for breakfast. We have guests in the house."

"They know their way around," he carelessly replied, far too distracted by his… ministrations.

"Doesn't make leaving them to fend for themselves any less rude," Mia managed, tensing as she felt his lips making their way back up the invisible path they'd traced before. "So, if you don't stop what you're doing in the next ten seconds, I'm afraid I'll have to take extreme measures to make you," she warned him, placing a finger against his lips before they could touch hers again. "Be good."

"But it's Christmas Eve," he complained like an annoyed little kid whose present had just been snatched away from under the tree.

"All the more reason for you to be good and for us to be nice to guests," Mia replied, receiving a groan in return. "Youhave a problem, you know?"

"Oh, I know. I very much know. Three months without kissing his wife makes that to a bloke," he stated, trying to sound absolutely miserable. "I thought the withdrawal might kill me."

"Poor thing," Mia mumbled, patting his cheek.

"Don't mock me," he said in a not-so-mocking tone. "I mean it. Seeing you every day through the two-way mirror just didn't cut it."

His wife sighed. "I know. But it's better than nothing. At least we got to talk… we didn't have that last time."

Sirius let out a long breath. "No, we didn't," he agreed in a low tone.

Mia eyed him quietly for a second before cupping his face and reaching to place a small kiss on his lips.

Sirius raised an eyebrow at her just as she pulled away. "I thought we weren't supposed to kiss anymore until breakfast."

Mia smiled. "I'm not the one with the problem," she replied before lacing her arm to his and walking him out of the room. "Now, Mr. Black, we're going downstairs, we're going to take breakfast and you're going to act like the grownup you're supposed to be instead of the randy teenager you actually are in your head. Are we clear?" she asked as they started making their way down the stairs.

"Provided my behaviour is rewarded later…" he offered cheekily.

She chuckled. "Maybe," Mia replied, reaching to kiss his cheek just as they reached the floor below their room.

"Oh, crap. I think I left my wand upstairs," Sirius declared, suddenly rummaging through his pockets. "You go on down while I get it, okay?"

Mia shook her head. "No, it's okay. I'll give you a minute."

Her husband nodded quickly before rushing upstairs, leaving her standing there alone with her thoughts.

She looked around for a moment as she crossed her arms against her chest, taking in the familiar shapes and colours of home. Home, she thought fleetingly. She was home… yet it didn't quite feel like _home. _Not in the way it used to. She might have fooled herself by wondering why that was the case but she didn't – that would take too much effort for something that wasn't bound to last. Truth was, home just wasn't home without Harry in it.

Taking a breath, she looked up from the floor she'd been staring at for the past handful of seconds, allowing her eyes to move towards the door leading into Harry's room. The door wasn't closed, she noted, observing a small crack between it and the doorway. Before she knew it, she was walking towards it, nudging the door further open and allowing the hallway's light to illuminate the otherwise dark room.

Aside from the darkness, actually, the room looked like Harry might just be downstairs having breakfast even though she consciously knew that wasn't the truth. The fact that Kreacher had mostly left it alone, aside from making the bed and collecting the dirty laundry, had left a distinct Harry vibe in the room. It made Mia smile, albeit sadly. She knew if she looked under the bed, she'd find a massive mess or, if she opened the wardrobe, half of its contents would probably fall on her from all the times she'd ordered her godson to clean his room and instead he'd shoved everything into the most obvious hiding places. Izzy often joked one of those days a boggart might find a home in either of those places – she honestly wouldn't be surprised if that did happen.

Sighing, Mia leaned against the doorway. She missed that boy like a severed limb. She missed his messes, the constant trouble he kept getting himself into, the bouts of fury he could get her to have sometimes… And just thinking it was Christmas Eve already and they had no idea where he might be… Who knew if he had a bed or a fire to sit by, away from the cold? Who knew if he'd even have a Christmas dinner that night? How she wished that the war would just take a day off so he could come home and be with them. One day. That wasn't so much to ask, was it?

"Love?" Mia heard her husband's voice saying behind her. She didn't turn, instead waiting for him to join her, which he naturally did. His arm came around her back as he rested his hand on her shoulder. "I'm sure he's fine, you know? He's not alone – he has Ron and Hermione with him. You know that."

"I know," she mumbled. "But he should be here. They all should."

Sirius nodded. "True. I guess that means we'll have to make Christmas extra special for them next year. Because they _will _be here next year," he added when Mia looked up at him with a doubtful expression on her face. "I'll hunt them down and bring them here myself if I have to."

Mia gave him a little smile. For some reason, she believed he would do it. He'd get Harry there for her. For a moment, she didn't even bother to think of the amount of danger that might involve. "Thank you."

He placed a kiss on her forehead. "Always," he whispered before nudging her back towards the stairs so they could make their way to the kitchen.

It didn't take them very long to start hearing the voices coming from it, getting louder with each step. Mia's guess was that everyone was already in there, which had her worrying for a second that she might be the worst hostess in the world. She wasn't wrong about one part at least: _everyone_ was there – Molly, Arthur, Izzy, Ginny, Alex, Mary, Kreacher and, more unexpectedly, her parents too.

"Mama!" Alex shouted just as he saw her coming through the doorway, speeding towards her until he was wrapped around her legs – one would think he hadn't spent the previous night talking her ear off about all the things he'd done in her absence.

She reached down to his level with smile. "Good morning, my little prince. Did you sleep well?"

The little boy nodded excitedly with a big grin on his face, that one remarkably similar to his father's.

"Don't I get a good morning kiss?" Mia asked her son.

"Yesh, Mama," the little boy declared, before all but launching himself around his mother's neck and placing a big sloppy kiss on her cheek.

"Have you eaten yet, mate?" Sirius asked Alex just as he pulled away from around his mother's neck.

He nodded immediately. "I hewping Kweacha now, Daddy," he declared happily.

"Are you?" Sirius asked with a chuckle, eyeing the house elf as he stood by the stove. "Well, why don't you give him a break for a minute and we go wish your sister a _proper_ good morning_,_" he suggested, reaching down to pick up his son and shooting Izzy a narrow-eyed look before they made their way to their future victim.

"Good morning, dear," Molly greeted Mia just as she reached the table, somehow standing by it balancing Mary on one hip while at the same time carrying a skillet full of bacon. "Would you like something to eat? There's still plenty left."

Mia nodded. "Thank you, Molly. You really didn't need to put yourself to work. I'm supposed to be the one doing that…"

"Oh, nonsense – you've just gotten home. Give yourself a little break," the woman told her easily. "Let me just fetch you some eggs and sausage."

Arthur sighed as he read the paper on the other side of the table. "My Molly just doesn't feel complete unless she's feeding an army or juggling half a dozen tasks at the same time," he commented casually.

"Well, let me at least take Mary," Mia offered, reaching for her youngest daughter, who eyed her with a sunny smile on her face. Mary had been all smiles ever since she'd gotten home – Mia liked to believe it was because she'd missed her. She'd wondered many times if the little baby she'd left behind back in September would remember her when she came home – she was fairly sure Mary did, although she was much less of a baby these days, leaning more towards a toddler, all dimpled cheeks, curious brown eyes and soft curls on her head.

"Oh, of course," Molly immediately conceded, putting the skillet down for a second so she could hand the little girl over. "You've probably missed this little angel so much. Such a dear… I honestly don't know where Sirius gets all those stories from…"

"Kid's an excellent actress, Molly," Sirius assured her from the other side of the table as he and Alex approached a suspicious Izzy. "Don't let yourself be fooled by the dimples and the giggles – I was graced with the sneakiest kids in the word. Well, in what comes to two of them, at least. Not so sure about the third, isn't that right, Izzybel?"

"I have no idea what you're referring to," his firstborn replied, forcing herself not to pay any more attention to him by casually taking a bite from her toast as she sat by an oddly lethargic Ginny's side.

"Well, maybe Alex here will be kind enough to remind you," he suggested, turning to his son with a grin. "Knock yourself out, mate. Whatever you do, she probably has it coming."

The little boy grinned before proceeding to reach for his sister's hair with his hands and starting mussing it up as badly as he could, which was surprisingly effective for a kid his age.

Mia watched the scene from the other side, her lips curling slightly although she knew she should probably interfere at some point. On her lap, Mary managed to pull herself up until she was standing on her little feet and trying to get her hands on everything she could possibly reach on the table. "Oh, not the fork, honey," she said, pulling the piece of cutlery from the little girl's hand and placing it, along with the knife, out of her reach.

Mary let out a few unsatisfied sounds but was quickly distracted by trying to grab her mother's hair and face in general when Mia shifted her position.

"That one's going to be just like her father," Lulu commented from the other side of the table. "Causing trouble all around."

Mia then turned to her mother. "And I don't doubt you'll be more than willing to urge her to do so as much a she wants," she replied.

Lulu shrugged. "Kids are supposed to get in trouble. Why fuss about it?"

Oh, how Mia wished she could share that vision as well… "I wasn't expecting to see you here so early," she told her mother.

"Neither was I but Gabe here wanted to make sure you'd really made it back in one piece. He's becoming a real mother-hen if you asked me," she said, nodding at her daughter's father, who happened to be raising his eyebrows at her by her side. "Even wanted go upstairs to check if you were alive because you were taking so long to come down, if you can believe it."

Gabe's eyebrows only rose further by her side. "Funny. The way I recall it, you were actually the one to suggest that."

"Well, clearly you're growing senile with old age, Gabriel," she quickly replied, averting his eyes.

"Yes, that must be it," he offered, looking at Mia and rolling his eyes. Both of them knew Lulu too well to buy that, just as both of them knew that when she wanted to go against her own nature by being protective (and, naturally, refused to let other people know about that), it wasn't beyond her to use the nearest person – in that case, Gabe – as a scapegoat.

"Well, regardless of which one of you is the mother-hen here, there is no need to worry," Mia assured her parents. "I'm perfectly fine – the trip down from Scotland was quite uneventful, even if just a bit uncomfortable, actually."

"And the school?" her father asked.

Mia looked down, trying to make her unwillingness to discuss Hogwarts's state so early in the morning as pure interest in what her daughter was doing. "Still where you left it last time you were there," she responded, averting the subject

Gabe nodded, successfully reading the subtext. "I'm sure it is," he agreed, willingly dropping the matter.

"Here you go, dear," Molly said as she started filling Mia's plate with enough bacon, eggs and sausage to feed a small army before moving over to Sirius's even though his chair was still empty. "Would you like some hash browns too, Mia? Sirius?" she inquired, turning to face the latter as he and Alex kept on bugging Izzy.

"Sure, Molly," he replied, ignoring his daughter as she tried to push him and her little brother away.

"Dad, get him off!" she said. "Mom, tell him to go bother people his own size!"

"I'm pretty sure Alex is the one doing the most damage and he's littler than you," her father stated.

Mia sighed. "Sirius, stop acting like a five-year-old and leave your daughter alone. Same applies to Alex."

Her husband groaned as he pulled their son away from his sister. "Looks like the fun's over, mate," he said, putting the little boy down. "Go sit with Gradma Lulu while Daddy eats, will you?"

Alex did as he said, but only because he knew his grandmother was an easy one to get to sneak him cookies. By the time Sirius took his seat by Mia's side, the little boy was already working his magic on his grandparents.

"Mum! Stop it – I'm not hungry!" Ginny suddenly protested from the other side of the table, apparently awaken from her lethargy by her mother getting to her on her plate-filling mission.

"Nonsense. You girls are all skin and bones. Honestly, what are they feeding you at Hogwarts?" the older woman said as she started filling Izzy's plate as well while she seemed to be distracted disentangling her hair from the mess Alex's attack had turned it into.

"The same they were feeding you back when you were there!" Ginny replied, exasperated.

"Ginny's right, Molly," Mia assured her from the other side of the table. "If there's anything that still hasn't changed at all at Hogwarts, it's the quality of the food."

"But still…" Molly mumbled before back at her daughter. "You've barely eaten anything this morning. Don't think I haven't noticed you pushing your food around the plate, Young Lady."

"I just don't feel like stuffing myself right now, Mum," Ginny said in an annoyed tone.

"She's got a point," Izzy offered, mostly for the sake of covering for her friend. "I mean, with Christmas Dinner right around the corner, we'd better save up some space or else we'll be digesting today's food until New Year's."

Molly seemed to consider that for a second. "Well, if that's the case… but you need to eat some more. Look at you, Ginny. You don't have the slightest bit of colour on your cheeks."

That part was actually accurate, Mia noted. Ginny, who usually managed to look even the slightest bit chipper in her worst days, looked far from her usual self that morning. She seemed tired and altogether out of it. It made Mia wonder if something was wrong. "Did you sleep well tonight, Ginny?" she asked.

The girl made a noncommittal sound before nodding and mumbling that it was just 'one of these days', whatever that meant. Mia might have pressed the matter if Mary hadn't distracted her by managing to shove her little hand into her mother's plate, grabbing a handful of greasy bacon, which would not doubt have been aimed at some unknowing person, had Mia not interfered quickly enough.

"You'd better lighten up for when your brothers get here, Ginny-girl," Arthur told his only daughter across the table. "Merlin knows Fred and George can't resist yanking your chain whenever they have a chance."

Izzy, who'd been taking a sip from her glass of juice, barely managed to hide her near-choking reaction to the mention of the twins… namely the one whose name started with a G. Somehow she'd let the fact that they were coming to stay that night slip her mind that morning, even though she'd obsessed over it until nodding off the previous night. "When… when exactly are they supposed to arrive?" she asked, trying hard not to sound too interested.

"Oh, they should come by after the meeting, I expect," Molly informed her. "Those boys are just working themselves mad…"

"Wait a second… the meeting?" Mia asked, confused as she used a napkin to clean Mary's hand. "What meeting?"

"Oh, damn, I forgot to tell you," Sirius stated all of a sudden. "Kingsley set up an informal Order meeting for this afternoon."

"On Christmas Eve?"

"There's no time to waste these days," Gabriel commented.

"I'm sure he won't take up too much time," Arthur pointed out. "He understands it's an inconvenient occasion."

Sirius nodded in agreement. "Arthur is right. From what I gathered, he mostly just wants to hear what's going on within Hogwarts from an insider – you, in this case. It shouldn't take more than a couple of hours. Three at the most and we'll be back to enjoy Christmas Dinner together."

Mia sighed. "I guess if it doesn't take longer than that…" she mumbled.

"I'm sure it won't, Mia, dear," Molly told her. "And if it does, you don't need to worry. I'll keep an eye on the children and help Kreacher setting up Christmas dinner while you are gone."

"Not going today, Molly?" Lulu inquired.

The redhead shook her head. "Arthur will fill me into what's important," she replied dismissively. "There's plenty of work needing to be done here." Plenty of work she needed to do if she wanted to keep her mind busy and away from all the reasons why that Christmas felt like a faint excuse for a Christmas. If she wanted to stay sane, she had to stay busy.

"Alright, then, I guess everything is on track, isn't it?" Sirius observed. "I've got to say, I haven't felt like this in a…"

Before he could finish that sentence, though, Mary, who unknowingly to Mia had managed to get her hands into some more food, used her little arms to throw a handful of porridge at her father's face.

"Mary!" Mia said in a scolding tone. "No! You don't throw food at Daddy! That's bad, honey."

Sirius groaned from his seat, looking down at his porridge-covered shirt. "Yeah, it did feel like things were flowing too easy this morning."

* * *

"'t smews funny," young Alex Black declared in an intrigued tone, sniffing the half-decorated Christmas tree standing in front of him.

"Well, that's because it's an actual tree," Izzy told him as she opened a large cardboard box resting on top of a chair, rummaging through a series of tree ornaments, trying to find the one she had in mind. "It's supposed to smell funny."

When her porridge-covered father had told her – after she'd shamelessly mocked him over the porridge-related incident because he really had it coming – that her long-time-coming punishment for her stunt with Snape would be to personally watch her brother while the 'adults' aside from Molly went to an Order meeting, Izzy had actually found herself swallowing hard. Because, although the kid was usually much better behaved around her than he was around her dad since he knew she was much more liberal when it came to giving him cookies (those seemed to be the one thing that he went out of his way to get), it was hard to get past his earlier betrayal through a ruthless attack on her hair (although it had mostly been her father's fault), not to mention the general hyper bout he'd been in ever since their mother had arrived home.

She couldn't deny it had been pretty adorable how he'd followed Mum around everywhere and how he'd rant endlessly about all the things he'd done in her absence (oh, the amount of Mama's boy material she was going to have to tease him in ten to fifteen years…), but one certainly needed to wonder where he'd channel all the clingy energy he'd saved up for that end while their mother was gone for the meeting – Izzy's mind had been quick to reach an answer: he was going to run her into the ground. Her and Ginny, who, thanks to Molly growing intrigued of the punishment, had been signed up for it as well despite her odd mood that day.

Right then and there, Izzy had seen the faintest glimpse of hell. Anyone could have told her (and she sure would have agreed) that any hope for a nap in what came to a kid who'd spent half an hour chasing Arnold, Ginny's poor pigmy-puff, around the library just before lunch was in vain. And she'd just been able to foresee that if she and Ginny somehow found a way to effectively double-team the little barbarian, sweet little, usually-exemplary afternoon-napper Mary would have given her reputation up just for the sake of living up to her father's statement from a few weeks before (upon talking to Izzy via two-way mirror after a long, restless day) that when her younger siblings wanted to drive someone mad, they did so with military precision.

Thankfully, when her father had tried to do even worse by giving her and Ginny a second task for that afternoon, said glimpse of hell has faded into bliss. The joke was on Sirius because there didn't seem to be anything like decorating a Christmas tree to turn a kid full of pent-up energy into a pleasantly holiday-struck, useful one. One could say the tree was his equivalent to what a light bulb was to a fly…

"Why?" Alex asked, referring back to the 'it smells funny' matter.

"I dunno. It just does. You ought to ask Neville if he was here – I was never very good at herbology. Plants in general for that matter, really," Izzy mumbled, her eyes still inspecting the inside of the box. "Hey, Ginny, do you want some of these red thingies for your side?" she asked her friend, holding up a bunch of sparkling red sphere-shaped ornaments. When her friend took a while to respond, Izzy looked up to find her just standing by her section of the tree, her eyes rather clouded as if her mind was anywhere but there. "Ginny? Are you listening? Ginny!"

She nearly jumped, accidentally knocking over a box of cone-shaped decorations, which made Alex giggle before trying to get his hands on a few. "Sorry, what was that?" the redhead mumbled.

"You looked miles away. Are you okay?"

"Sure. I was just thinking," she said quickly, reaching down to pick up the discarded ornaments. "What were you saying, anyway?"

"I was asking if you wanted some of these," Izzy replied, showing her the ornaments.

"Oh, sure," she replied, that time actually turning her attention to the tree. Merlin, her section was a bloody mess – she needed to concentrate more on the decorations and less on her… frustrations.

"Hand those over to Ginny, will you?" she told her little brother, moving some ornaments into a smaller box and handing it over to him before mussing up his hair.

The little boy giggled before making a small run over to Ginny, who, Izzy noticed, couldn't offer him much more than a faint smile upon accepting the box. Something was wrong with Ginny. Izzy didn't know what and, worse, wasn't even close to finding out since her friend had showed all signs of not wanting to talk about it. She might try to press it out of Ginny but, Merlin, what kind of friend would that make her when, just the day before, Ginny had agreed to give her space and not ask about her having the hots – quoting, just quoting – for George?

"I wanna put those," Alex announced as he looked into the nearest box of ornaments, having climbed onto the chair next to it at some point.

"Those are for the upper part, Alex," she told him. "You can't reach it. Plus, you've already decorated your section," she added, pointing at an adorably chaotic little portion of the bottom of the tree, full of overlapping ornaments and covered with far too many garlands.

Alex looked disappointed, though the look didn't last much more than a second. "Youw tall," he stated, looking up at her hopefully.

She really wasn't tall at all, though her not-so-impressive stature might rub a kid his size as significant. Izzy sighed – her brother knew how to play his cards. She'd give him that. "Alright. I guess you could give me a hand with the upper part," she said. "But there's a catch to this deal."

The little boy nodded enthusiastically, probably because he didn't know what the word 'catch' meant in that context.

"Next time daddy tells you to mess with me like this morning, you turn around and do it on him," she told him. "Deal?"

Alex grinned – that part, he seemed to catch perfectly. "Deal."

"Okay, up you come, then," she said, reaching over to pick him up. "Merlin, you weigh a ton these days."

"'m a big boy," her brother said proudly as Izzy balanced him on her hip.

"No, you're not. You need to be at least five to be a big boy in my book," she replied as she made her way to the tree. "How old are you again?" she asked, feigning forgetfulness.

"Twee," Alex announced, showing her the same number of fingers.

"Liar," she replied with a snort.

Her brother pouted in return. "Amwost twee," he mumbled. "Daddy said so."

"Did Daddy?" she asked. Alex nodded with an adorably serious look on his face. "Bet he only says that when you're being a little monster," she commented, to which Alex responded with an underwhelming roar. "Oh, scary, isn't he, Ginny?"

"Hum?" Ginny asked absently from the other side of the tree. "Oh… er, sure."

Izzy raised an eyebrow for a moment. Something definitely was not right with her. She couldn't just ignore it. "Gin, are you…?"

"I'm fine," she said quickly, shooting her an 'I don't want to talk about it' look.

Izzy let out a deep breath. It was hopeless. "Alright, kid, let's get to work," she told her brother since his seemed to oddly be the only front that was working.

They worked on decorating the tree with giggles and clumsy hands. Izzy sure lost count of the amount of ornaments that fell on the floor or were somehow hung upside down. She didn't bother to move those last ones – Alex seemed happy enough with the way they were arranged and she didn't want to crush his pleasantly holiday-fuelled cheerful mood. At the end of it, when Izzy looked at their proud Christmas achievement, it was the messiest, most mismatched tree she'd seen in a long time… probably since she was seven and Harry nine and Lulu had the brilliant idea of putting them in charge of ornamenting the tree.

"Well, I guess it's done," Ginny mumbled. "I should go wash my hands. They're covered in tree sap."

"Alright," Izzy slowly agreed as her friend made her way out, still wondering what had made her shift from the perfectly balanced mood she'd had the precious day to that moody, often-absent shell of herself.

"'s she sad?" Alex asked her in a whisper.

Izzy turned to him with raised eyebrows. "Why do you ask?" Could the kid have seen something she hadn't? They said little kids were sensitive to these things…

Alex just shrugged. "I'm thirsty," he told her, completely changing the subject. "Canna have a cwookie?"

She huffed… well, he was just three, after all. Focusing was still far away from his list of priorities. "Cookies don't cure thirst, Alex," she informed him. Her brother just offered her one of his adorable 'please' looks, completely ignoring the fact. Tempted, she checked her watch for a second. "Well, I guess by the time the sugar kicks in Mum and Dad will be home… I guess today is your lucky day."

The little boy cheered, quickly demanding to be put down so he could rush to his promised cookie. Izzy let him because she knew he wouldn't be able to go too far – protective charms on the stairs didn't let him step foot on them without a 'grown up' holding him or his hand.

"Ginny, we're going downstairs," she when she reached the hallway, hoping her friend would hear her and join them. "Do you want to come too?"

"_No, thanks. I'll just stay here and tidy things up_," she replied from the loo.

Izzy sighed. "Okay, then," she mumbled to herself as she got a hold of her brother's hand and helped him down the stairs.

She was glad to hear Kreacher and Molly's voices coming from the dining room, meaning they clearly weren't in the kitchen, leaving the field open for her to steal that cookie for Alex. She made a 'be quiet' gesture to the little boy as they crossed the ground floor headed to the flight of stairs leading to the basement kitchen, which he mimicked, clearly eager to be sneaky.

"Alright, let's get you that cookie," Izzy mumbled after they entered the kitchen, approaching the cupboards and opening the one where the cookie jar could usually be found. Frowning, she noted it wasn't there. She moved to the next cupboard, than the other when she didn't find it there either. Why on earth was it so hard to find? A giggle behind her answered the question for her – no doubt if the kid knew where the jar was, his little bouts of accidental magic would have found a way to get it to him, she thought as she turned around to find him hiding (badly) behind one of the chairs by the fireplace.

She tried to use her wand to summon the jar, knowing the wards around the house would block any alarm bells from the trace, but it didn't come. Merlin, had they gotten to the point of placing anti-summoning charms around the jar? "You're a piece of work with your cookies, aren't you, Alex?" she said under her breath.

It took her several minutes of searching, but she eventually came face to face with the sought-after jar bizarrely hidden in the broom cupboard, inside an old, long-discarded cauldron. "There you are, you little…"

"Why does it seem like you're doing something rather clandestine and, if that's the case, why am I not in on it?" a familiar voice suddenly came from behind her, startling her into dropping the jar.

She braced herself to hear it breaking but it never did. When she looked down, she found it hovering about an inch away from the floor.

"So, Isabelle, are you going to pick that up or should I?"

Izzy grunted, reaching down to pick the jar up. "You know, next time you feel like giving me a heart attack, consider that stabbing me is probably a much more effective way to kill me," she told George dryly without bothering to look back.

"Yeah, but that's bound to be so much bloodier. Plus, who'd laugh at my written jokes if you were dead?" he replied.

She couldn't help curling her lips at the response – he _always _had to have an answer ready, didn't he? "Who says I laugh at them at all?" she replied, finally turning around to face him as he stood against the kitchen doorway, grinning in a 'we both know I'm right' sort of way. Merlin, why did that awake the butterflies in her stomach? _Why? _"Anyway," she said, using the excuse of walking over to the kitchen table with the jar as an excuse to look away from him, "how did you get in here without me hearing the doorbell? The floo is still disconnected."

"Mum saw me walking over from a window, I guess," he casually replied. "She let me in before I even had a chance to knock. Fussed some, as usual, before some plate-related crisis captured her attention instead. '_Oh, Georgie, you're all skin and bones! Don't you and your brother eat at all? Why isn't he here with you?_' The usual stuff."

"Where _is _Fred?" she asked matter-of-factly, now that he mentioned it.

"He went over to see Angelina before she left for Christmas at her parents' place. Wanted to give her a little 'present', he said," George told her, making a face as he approached the table and pulled a chair to sit on. "Since he seemed pretty eager to do it alone and I don't recall him actually _buying_ anything, I figured said present might involve things that, if witnessed by me, would make me want to risk my sanity by obliviating myself, so I kindly decided he could probably live through it on his own. If Mum asks, though, there are no obliviation-inducing activities involved whatsoever – just respectful handholding and potential light smooching."

Izzy rolled her eyes, sitting across the table from him. She'd imagined their first meeting face-to-face after the kiss would be much more… solemn. But she'd anguished about it for nothing because, aside from the butterflies' wings batting their wings much, much harder in her stomach that they usually did when she was writing to him, it was just… them. Playful banter and comfortable talks. As long as it stayed there, she was fine. _They _were fine. "Your mother is not that thick, you know?" she risked saying. "She's probably known what Fred is up to for years."

George groaned, shrugging. "Let me enjoy my self-induced ignorance in peace, will you? I think it's time we move on to other matters… such as me literally catching you with your hands all over the cookie jar. Sneaking cookies between meals, Isabelle? Shocking!"

"Appalling," she offered. "But I'll have you know, though, that my wrongdoing wasn't really for myself. Alex loves his cookies and, since he was such a good tree-decorating assistant, I was going to give him one as a reward while at the same time hoping the sugar wouldn't kick in until my parents came home and I could dump him on them."

"Well, I'd say a sugar rush is the last thing you need to worry about right now," he pointed out.

"What do you mean?"

In response, George gestured towards one of the armchairs by the fireplace, where she found her younger brother curled up on and drooling all over the chair's arm as he slept. How hadn't she noticed she hadn't heard him in a while? "If anything sugar-related, the issue here is a crash, not a rush. Trust me, I have long years of experience when it comes to sugar-related ailments. Want help moving him?"

"And risk waking him up? No way. Give him a few minutes to make sure the kid's really under," she said. "Honestly, now that the Christmas tree is basically set up, I was starting to wonder about what I could find to keep him occupied next. It's not really an easy thing to achieve in his hyper days."

"Yes, I've heard stories of little Alex, the barbarian," George said. "Your father sure tells them intensely enough to make one wonder if the kid is growing up to be some sort of criminal mastermind. Tonks insists he's exaggerating by a lot, though…"

"It wouldn't surprise me. Dad's pretty dramatic, though, to be fair, Alex is known for acting a little less manic around girls," she pointed out.

"Likes to impress the ladies, I see," George concluded.

"Don't you all?" Izzy mumbled.

"_Us _all? Who do you mean by 'us all'?" he replied, raising an eyebrow.

She gulped, wondering, in fact, who she had meant. "Hum… blokes with a perch for trouble-making? What? You're not going to tell me you're not one of those, are you?"

"And deny my most remarkable character? Of course not, Isabelle. I might as well be calling you stupid if I tried, which I'm pretty sure would probably get me injured in a way or another" he stated, causing her to reply with a grin in recognition of him knowing her so well. "Though," he added, "when it comes to impressing girls, it depends on the girl."

For a moment, she almost felt tempted to ask him if he was trying to impress her before quickly stopping herself – that would surely jump the line between friendly bantering and… _flirting_. She was threading dangerous ground… Friendly bantering was easy – she liked it because it was so… them. Flirting, well… would make it _very _hard not to think back to what they'd done last time they'd actually been within ten feet of each other. "Right… hum," she mumbled, trying to think of a way to shift that conversation somewhere else. "Anyway, I didn't think you were coming by until the Order meeting was over."

"It _is _over," he pointed out. "Your parents just haven't made it back yet because they went somewhere with Kingsley. Some kind of meeting he'd arranged for your Mum or something – I didn't really ask for more details. Didn't sound dangerous, though, so don't worry about it."

Izzy imagined he was right – somehow, the only possible meeting that would cross her mind arranged by Kingsley for her mother involved her mother's best friend, Elizabeth, in some way or another. "Well, and…?"

"And what?"

"What went on at the meeting?" she asked.

"You do know I'm not supposed to share that, right? With you being underage and not an Order member."

She gave him a pointed look, silently asking him whenever he did what he was supposed to.

He groaned. "That's not very fair, you know? Using my own history against me…"

"I didn't say anything," she replied, biting her lip to keep herself from taunting him with a grin.

"No. You were thinking it. I can tell," he replied, narrowing his eyes.

"You read minds now?" she inquired.

"It's all over your face," he pointed out. "_That _I can read."

She gulped. He was probably just saying that – he had to be. Because if he wasn't, she just had to wonder about how much he knew about her… crush on him. Izzy wasn't sure how good she was at hiding it… she shook her head, telling herself not to go there. "Well, just spill it, then. If you can read my face _so _well, you know I'm calling you on that whole 'oh, I'm not supposed to share' crap."

He chuckled audibly. "Fine. Give me one of those and I'll cave," he said, nodding at the cookie jar.

Izzy smiled, reaching for the jar and sliding it across the table towards him. He caught it easily, quickly removing the lid and snatching a cookie.

"Chocolate. Nice," he said before taking a bite.

"Well?" she prompted.

"Impatient, aren't you, Isabelle?" George observed. "It wasn't that interesting, you know? There weren't even that many people in there. I actually had to punch Fred's arm a bunch of times so he wouldn't slip into a stream of daydreams featuring Angie and whatever plans he had for her…"

"Hey! You got your cookie, I want my data," she stated.

"Fine, fine. I'll give you your data," he said, lifting up his hands in defeat. "As I said, it was pretty boring: assigning tasks, discussing missions – not even the exciting kind, by the way. Those are mostly under the grid. The most interesting part was actually your mum's account of things inside Hogwarts, which I guess wouldn't be that interesting to you since you were there yourself. Aside from that…" He paused, suddenly thoughtful for a second. "Well, I guess there is one thing…"

"What?"

"It's about… you know that Harry has relatives, right?" he asked before getting to the point. "Blood relatives… an aunt, cousins…"

Izzy nodded. "Yes. He mentioned that sometime last summer. Dad did too." It felt odd to think of Harry having relatives that weren't related to her as well. True, it was bound to happen, given that they weren't blood related, but still… thinking of Harry as anything less than an actual brother didn't come naturally to her. He'd always been there for as long as she could remember, sometimes tormenting her, sometimes protecting her… filling the shoes of an older brother like no one else ever would. "They were pretty awful, according to Dad – Harry's aunt and her husband, that is. Harry mentioned the kids seemed nice, though."

George nodded. "Sounds right, according to what Hestia and Dedalus said. Anyway, apparently, they're causing some trouble now… or rather the dad is. They were taken under the order's protection last summer and that involves moving around. Last time they did, they were placed somewhere only temporarily because Hestia suspected the previous house they were in was exposed. The new place wasn't somewhere ideal – it was kind of a bad place for them to be, actually, but since they weren't supposed to stay for more than a week until they found a place in another village for them to go, it had to do… except when the time came to move them again, Harry's uncle put his foot down."

"What? Why?"

"He's a big fat idiot, Isabelle. Honestly, the way Dedalus described him made me want to punch him even before I had a chance to meet him. Anyway, he put his foot down and now won't let them move him anywhere else, which, given where he is, is apparently not good at all."

"What do you mean by 'not good at all'?"

He shook his head. "You'd have to ask Hestia and Dedalus – I don't really know where they are. We chose to keep those kind of details as limited as possible. We just know they're somewhere potentially dangerous and that the bloke – Victor or Vernard… whatever his name is – won't listen when they tell him he has to move at least one more time or else his arse may very well be fried."

"What a moron…" Izzy mumbled. More than a moron, she added in thought. It really was a relief that the man was in no way related to Harry. He didn't get it, did he? That if they caught him and his family, they'd use them against his nephew… and likely not in a way that would leave any of them indifferent. And the worst part was that, as awful as his aunt and uncle were, Harry was not the kind of person who'd leave them to rot even if his life depended on it. If anything, for his cousins' sakes. "Can't they force him to go or something?"

"They could, probably. But then things would get sticky from there – they'd essentially be prisoners, making us sort of the bad guys… let's just say the Order will avoid that for as long as they can. The trick here is to talk him out of his idiocy. If not him, his wife – honestly, without her and the kids on a tow, I doubt anyone would be interested on a prat like that even if he stays behind. I'm sure Hestia and Dedalus will handle it one way or the other," he informed her. "Still, it doesn't make the bloke any less of a pain in the arse. If he's like that in a regular basis, I'd say Harry was lucky not to have to spend holidays around those…" George paused suddenly. "Sorry. Bad time to bring that up."

"Don't apologize," she told him instantly. "I know he won't be here for Christmas. You know it. Everyone knows it. It sucks, yeah, but it's not it's anyone's fault. Well, at least not anyone in this room."

"I dunno," George replied, his lips curling a little, if only for the sake of cheering her up. "Your brother over there looks pretty guilty if you asked me."

Izzy couldn't help chuckling lightly as she turned on the chair in order to face the little boy sleeping on the armchair by the fireplace. "You did say something about him being a criminal mastermind in disguise," she offered before clicking her tongue. "I guess if that's the case, we'll have to take his cookies away."

"Tough love," George said, nodding. "Too bad cookie embargos don't work on everyone, or else we wouldn't have His Evilness, Mr. Chief Death Eater to worry about now."

"His Evilness, Mr. Chief Death Eater?" Izzy asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Just one of many nicknames Fred and I came up with for when we finally put our little wireless project on the air. In our defence, _His Evilness_ has brought it on himself – he's the one who won't let us use his real name…"

"That's a fair point," Izzy agreed with a chuckle. Only George… "Any idea when the _Resistance Network_ will be reaching the airwaves?"

"Oh, it's actually not the _Resistance Network_ anymore. It wasn't catchy enough, so we decided to go for _Potterwatch_ instead," George informed her.

"_Potterwatch_? Really?"

"Really. It sounded like an even bigger kick on the general arse of our favourite dark-cloaked freaks," he stated. "As for reaching the airwaves, well, I guess it shouldn't be too long now. We haven't been in much of a hurry because we had to deal with closing the shop and we know Xeno's been covering most of our bases over at the Quibbler, but I guess things will move quicker from now on. We already have plenty of contributors, equipment ready to use, locations on hold for the first broadcasts… basically, Lee just needs to say the word. He's the one running the show now."

Izzy nodded. "And the shop…"

George sighed. "It's just temporary. We'll open back up when things get better at Diagon Alley…"

"What if they don't get better?"

"They will," he stated firmly. "I've told you a hundred times, Isabelle. Don't tell me I've wasted all that ink writing that down for you just so you'd ignore it."

Izzy sighed. He _had _spelled that for her many times – not hundreds but certainly a few dozens. If it weren't for all those times, she probably would have lost her mind by then. He had a way of making her believe in… in something better. True, it was only a temporary belief but by the time she was about to let go of it, he'd come back and make her believe again. Ignoring it wasn't an option. "I didn't ignore it but, I mean, it's _your shop_. You and Fred have been planning it since you were… I dunno… my age?"

George chuckled. "Try twice his age," he said, pointing at Alex. "But we're not done with it. We've just closed the storefront because there were barely any people coming by anymore and it was getting sort of dangerous to stay open for the public. We've still got plenty of business from the owl orders – it's not as flashy as the shop but it's something. _Really_something. I mean, we had to stay up until three in the morning last night just so we could send everything out in time for Christmas. I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have managed it between me, Fred, Lee and Remus if Tonks hadn't offered a hand. True, baby Lupin's only making her clumsier but she knows all sorts of wicked packing spells. Plus, it's a hoot to hear her threatening Remus when he gets too protective."

It was hard not to smile as she pictured the image in her head: Fred and George snickering around as Tonks pointed her wand at her husband in the midst of several owl order packa… She stopped picturing that upon recalling, all of a sudden, something she'd been forgetting until then. "Speaking of packing and stuff," she said, "these owl orders mean you and Fred have been mailing a lot of stuff around, right?"

"Obviously," George replied with a snort.

"So, say I asked you for some help mailing something – a big something – to someone… do you think you could comply?"

"Sure. Where do you want it sent?"

She hesitated for a second, easily predicting his (understandable) reaction. "Malfoy Manor."

"Malfoy Manor?" George asked in disbelief, raising his tone an octave. "You want to send something to Malfoy Manor? Is it a cursed something? Please tell me it's a cursed something. Something that will explode the minute a Malfoy touches it. "

"Shhh," Izzy shushed him, turning to check on her sleeping brother for a moment. "It's not an exploding something. But don't worry, it's not some tasteful Christmas present either. It's basically a pain in my arse that I will simply transfer to theirs."

George raised an eyebrow. "Alright, you'll have to be a little more specific, Isabelle."

She sighed, wondering where on earth to begin. "Okay… remember when I got caught in Snape's office?"

"Of course," George replied immediately. "On Halloween night."

"Yes," she said, surprised he remembered the day in specific. That day had, however, been the first time they'd spoken through the papyrus. Could that have something to do with…? _Stop overthinking it, for Merlin's sake_. "Well," she forced herself to continue, "the thing about the headmaster's office is that you're never really alone in there, even when it seems you are."

He raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"The headmasters' portraits," she provided.

"Oh," he mumbled. "Hadn't thought of those. They're usually just… there."

"Not many of them these days, actually – or rather they _are _but the headmasters in them have gone somewhere else because they can't stand Snape. Unfortunately, though, that's not the case for _all _of them. Which wouldn't be so bad if one of those who stayed behind hadn't been my great-who-knows-how-many-times-great grandfather, Phineas Nigellus Black, who just happens to be a death-eater-loving, prejudiced old bat on a portrait that obviously hates me and really anyone descending from my disowned father. Not that I blame Dad for this or anything – Merlin knows I'd have made a run for it too if my parents were even a little like that… that _thing_…"

George frowned. That didn't sound good. Didn't sound good at all… "So, if he was in there when you broke in…" He still wasn't quite sure what they'd been doing in there that day – she'd asked him not to ask about that and he'd complied. But still he could tell it had to be something important and potentially dangerous for her not to want to share. There weren't many things they didn't share these days aside from certain truths he didn't even dare to think about. "Just how much does he have on you?" he asked. "Dirt, I mean."

"Enough to get me, Ginny, Neville and Luna in a lot of trouble," she stated. "Possibly far beyond a trip to the forest during a supposed full moon. Which is why I had to make a deal with him so he wouldn't tell – he was more than willing to rat us out and leave us to rot, believe me."

"What deal?" he asked, alarmed.

"Not a very bad one, don't worry," she assured him. "Phineas has a second portrait here in this house – we keep it in the attic because, as you can imagine, he's as pleasant here as he's at Hogwarts. So, I promised him that if he agreed to keep his mouth shut, I'd send our portrait of him over to a branch of the family that would… appreciate him more than we do," she told him.

"The Malfoys."

"Yes," she said. "He's not doing anything here. He's been shut up there for years so he can't possibly pass any important information to them. He just wants to be gone and if that's going to help keeping me and my friends safe, I don't care if…" She suddenly stopped talking, though, as the sound of steps coming down the stairs reached their ears.

Seconds later, Molly hurriedly made her way into the kitchen. "Oh, I didn't know you were down here, dears," she said, smiling faintly at both of them. If there was any hint of suspicion at seeing both of them alone and so engulfed in their conversation, Molly surely didn't show it. To be honest, Izzy thought she might be too preoccupied with other matters to notice…

"Ginny didn't seem to be in a very talkative mood," George said in explanation. "She shipped me down here to go 'bother Izzy' – her words, not mine – before I had a chance to as much as ask her about her train ride yesterday."

Molly sighed. "Yes, she seems to be a bit under the weather, doesn't she? Oh, look at that," she said when she spotted Alex's sleeping form on the armchair.

"Yeah, apparently he fell asleep there while I was… fetching him some water," Izzy said, causing George to have to stifle a snort, clearly knowing water had been far from what she'd come to fetch him, which earned him a glare.

"Poor thing must've been tired," Molly said in a motherly tone. "Izzy, dear, if you were just down here to keep an eye on him, you can go upstairs. Both of you go. I'll take him up to bed when I'm done checking on the turkey. I believe you and Ginny have already done enough to be set free from your babysitting chores."

"Great," George said for her, standing up. "Now you can show me that portrait you were telling me about. It sounds _hysterical._"

Show him the portrait? That day? What would he want to see the portrait that day when he wouldn't be leaving until after Christmas? "Alright," she mumbled, getting up as well. "Thank you, Molly," she told the matronly redhead who responded with an absent 'sure, dear', seeing as she'd already gotten busy preparing the gravy for the roasting bird. George was waiting for her by the door so he could let her lead the way. She raised an eyebrow a she reached the stairs. "Now?"

He shrugged. "Why not? Kind of need to see what I'm dealing with."

"Okay, then. Follow me – it's in the attic," she mumbled, climbing up the stairs.

The last floor of the house didn't quite feel… home. To be honest, she couldn't even remember the last time she had been up there. Before her father had come back, she'd snuck into his old room – which shared the floor with his brother's and the access to the attic – a few times to try and get to know him better. She was thankful that, now that she'd had a few years to get to know him in the first person, she no longer had much of a reason to go up there… well, aside from the present.

"The entrance is up there," she told George, pointing at a hatch on the hallway's ceiling. "Give me just a secon…" She stopped talking when the hatch opened it itself right before her eyes and a ladder came down. She turned back, raising her eyebrows at the redhead behind her, who happened to be holding his wand. "Really?"

"What? Were you planning to reach up there without magic?"

"I _was _going to use magic, smartarse! The Trace doesn't work in here," she informed him.

"That's not fair. Fred and I had to wait until we were seventeen to use magic outside of the school!"

"Poor you. It's not my fault the wards are too bloody thick for the trace to figure out whatever is going on in here," she explained. "And before you ask, yes, that means Ginny and I can curse you if you and Fred act like bloody prats," she told him.

"Okay, okay," he said, lifting his hands up in defeat. "Can we just go on up there, Isabelle?"

She smirked, victorious. "Fine. But I should tell you – don't touch anything up there as shinny or as harmless as it might look. There were pretty dangerous things in this house before we moved in – I think Kreacher got rid of the worst of it but I'm not sure how safe the non-worst is. Wouldn't want you to lose a body part or anything."

"Seriously?" he asked dryly.

She nodded, starting to climb up the ladder. "Yeah. You'd probably look pretty weird missing one of those."

"Thanks," George said dryly. He joined her up in the dusty attic seconds later, lighting the tip of his wand to help Izzy illuminate their surroundings. "Well, where are they?"

"That's what I'm trying to figure out," she declared, moving her wand around, trying to see through the darkness and the clutter.

George walked around too, keeping his wand lit as he scanned through the room with his eyes. There was plenty of crap laying around, from piles of books to chests full of Merlin-knew-what but no sign of… "Ah, there," he said just as soon as he spotted a few portraits resting on the floor against an old dresser.

"Finally," she mumbled under her breath, quickly making her way to them and reaching for the first, which appeared to be covered by a curtain. Just on the moment when she pulled on the curtain covering it, all hell broke loose.

The ear-piercing scream that came from behind the curtain nearly gave her a heart attack and caused her to jump so far back that her back landed straight onto George's chest. She thought it might be a banshee – it sure sounded like one. But then she realized it _really_ was the portrait screaming. That was vaguely familiar…

"Holly sh…" George mumbled, wrapping a protective arm around her before muttering an expulsion hex to send the portrait away from them and then, when it wouldn't shut up, used another spell to get the discarded curtain to wrap itself around the screaming portrait, hoping to at least muffle it. It seemed to work as, seconds later, instead of muffling the portrait, the curtain actually quieted it.

None of them spoke for about thirty seconds after that – they were mostly too busy trying to get their hearts to start beating again.

"What… the hell… was _that_?" George asked slowly gaping at the now-covered portrait.

Izzy gulped, far too distracted by the fact that he still had _his arm around her_. In a protective way. And it felt damn good.

"Isabelle?" he said, dropping said arm.

"Ah, right," she mumbled, stepping forward and forcing herself not to look at him. The portrait had just scared the senses out of both of them – nothing to be ashamed about nearly jumping him. "It think it might've been my grandmother," she said. "I remember her having a portrait down there when we arrived. She was… touchy, to say the least."

"You don't say," he mumbled sarcastically. "And here I thought that was like looking at a picture of you in a thousand years."

… and just like that he was idiot-George all over again. She turned around on a flash, punching him hard on the arm before he had a chance to escape. That little…

"Hey! That was a joke!" he assured her, rubbing his arm.

"Not a good one," she pointed out.

"Duly noted," he said. "Merlin, Isabelle. A bit violent, aren't you?"

"Only when people have it coming," she replied.

He rolled his eyes at her. "Alright, let's just find that portrait, shall we?"

"Right," she mumbled, reaching for the next one on the pile, noting it was empty aside from the background of the painting. "It could be this one, I guess. It's been a while since I saw it – I can't really tell without his always pleasant frown gracing the frame."

"_You took your sweet time, didn't you, girlie?"_

Startled by the familiar voice, Izzy gasped and dropped the frame back onto the pile.

"_Careful! This painting if fragile! It's a masterpiece!_" it said, the voice muffled by the fact that his painting was pressed against the next one.

George was the one to get a hold of it next time, only to see Phineas already present in there. That portrait was slightly different from the one at Hogwarts – less heavy on the Slytherin colours –but he looked just as fussy as George remembered seeing him at the school. The little bastard, he thought as he turned it over and placed it down leaning back against the other portraits.

"_Oh, I remember you. You're one of those troublemakers who share the same face_," Phineas observed.

"Well, most people call us 'twins' but that could just be slang when you were alive a few millennia ago," George commented, turning to Izzy for a moment only to see her biting hard on her lip. He wasn't surprised Phineas would recognize him – their proneness for trouble had certainly landed him enough times in Dumbledore's office for him to be on first-name basis with basically every headmaster on the wall.

"_In my time, insolent boys like you would've been flogged_," Phineas told him, narrowing his painted-on eyes.

"Yeah, well, if it was still your time, you wouldn't need a portrait to talk, would you?"

"_How dare…_"

"Hey, stop being rude to him," Izzy demanded, moving until she stood next to George opposite the portrait. "You should be thanking him – he's the one who's helping me get you to the Malfoys."

"_Him?"_ Phineas said, quite scandalized. "_Why should I trust _he _will even try to get my portrait there safely?"_

"Because, unlike you, I care for Isabelle," he said, making Izzy's heart skip a beat. "And the last thing I would want was for her – or my sister for that matter – to get in trouble with Snape and the Carrows because I didn't help them keep their promise, therefore leading you to blab. On the other hand, though," George added. "What assures us that you won't spill everything over to Snape just as soon as you cosy up with the Malfoys?"

Phineas pursed his lips. "_I am a man of my word_."

George snorted at that. "Sure… now, completely unrelated, weren't you successor to some bloke who got sacked because you and a bunch of students who, coincidently, happened to be all related to you, went to the school board saying he was a drunk?"

"_What are you implying, boy_?"

"Me? Implying? No, I'm just recalling a few things I learned from this five-foot-long essay on the Headmasters of Hogwarts from the 19th and the 20th century that McGonagall made me and Fred write during one of our many detentions," George informed him. "But if you want me to imply something, by all means, let me imply – or rather state – the following: if you as much as breathe a word to Snape, the Carrows or really anyone for that matter about what really happened on Halloween night, my brother Fred and I will burn this portrait into a crisp. Got it?"

Izzy gaped at him in surprise. What was he doing? Was he… was he threatening the stupid portrait just to make sure she'd be safe? _No_, she told herself. _It's not just you – Ginny's in the middle too_. But he _had _said he cared about her. She'd known that before – he'd made it clear in the past. But something when said it just made her… ugh, she was going mad. She really was going mad.

"And how do you intend to do that, boy, if I'm to be at Malfoy Manor by then?" Phineas asked, without realizing just how stupid he was being, all but assuring George he _was _going to betray them.

George smiled. "Isabelle?"

"Yes?" she asked quickly, jumpy that he'd called her name.

"Have I ever told you about this little spell Fred and I came up with to… let say, clean up after ourselves. It works miracles in what comes to… _disposing_ out of evidence."

"Sounds interesting," she played along, starting to catch what he was getting at.

"It is. It really is. See, you say '_Specto Testemonium_'. Or rather just think it – it works better when it's unspoken. Like this, you know?" he stated, reaching for his wand and waving it in front of a somehow very pale Phineas, who all but lost it when a few red sparks came from the tip, even though nothing really happened. "And then," George continued, "when you're already connected to that evidence and think 'hey, that thing would be way better if it were ash', regardless of how far away you may be from it, you just wave your wand like this and say '_erad_…'"

"_Stop_!" the portrait shouted. "_I got the point_."

"Oh, I see you do," George said, turning back to Izzy. "As you can see, it's pretty easy. And if, say, you want to use it on an extra set of evidence in Snape's office, all you really need to do is find an excuse for him to get you there and use the spell silently when he'd distracted. Works like a charm, I tell you."

"I'm sure it does," Izzy agreed.

"_Enough. That's enough_," Phineas told them. "_I won't talk – you got what you wanted. Now remove the spell!_"

"What for? It won't do anything until I say 'eradic…'"

"_Don't! Just get me out of here. I am sick… _sick _of you people_!"

George grinned. "Alright, then. I'll pick you up from here the day after tomorrow when I leave. Nice meeting you, Phineas." And, with that, he picked the portrait up, turned it around so Phineas's face was hidden and left it there. "You coming, Isabelle?"

"Er… yeah," she said, immediately following him. "That was…" she mumbled after they'd left the attic, George pushing the ladder out of the way and closing the entrance to it behind him. "That was some spell."

"Yeah," he agreed. "It'd be pretty wicked if it actually existed."

Izzy gaped at him. "It's fake?"

"Not as far as Phineas knows," he told her.

"Merlin," she mumbled. "That was… that was really good lying."

George grinned. "I prefer the expression 'story-telling'. And it worked – I'm pretty sure he won't open his mouth about you for anything in this world."

Izzy just looked at him for a moment. "Thank you."

He shook his head. "Don't. It's always a pleasure to scare the life out of a bastard like that one. Or, well, the afterlife in this case…"

"No, George, I mean it. Thank you. I hadn't thought everything through – it hadn't even occurred to him how he might blab after I'd kept my part of the deal. We'd be toast without you."

He rolled his eyes. "Well, trust me when I tell you this was for purely selfish reasons. As I've said before, life would be pretty boring you without you just a parchment away to talk to."

She smiled at him. "Yeah, these days my life would be pretty sucky without you there too," she told him. "I guess a proper payback would be to save your arse next time you do something stupid and I'm around."

"I'm not really keeping a scoreboard here," he pointed out, smirking. "But I won't mind having my arse saved by you if I ever need to. Provided _you_ don't do something stupid on the process, that is."

She chuckled. "We'll see about that."

"Hopefully not."

"Yet likely yes."

He raised an eyebrow. "Thanks a lot for the vote of confidence, Isabelle."

Her lips curled further and unexpectedly, she found herself looking at his. She looked away immediately but, by the time she did, the thought was already planted in her mind. What would it feel like to kiss him again? Last time he's been the one to initiate it… maybe if she did that time he wouldn't call it stupid…

She stopped herself. Her brain could not be serious. It simply couldn't – she'd put herself through such an effort not to let her mind go there, yet on the single second she'd let herself slide, it stumbled spectacularly on the idea of kissing him? _No, _she thought. _Bad brain_!

The doorbell rang downstairs, startling them both.

"That's probably Fred," George declared, likely unaware of the single second she'd spent considering making a feast out of his lips.

"Oh. You should probably go meet him downstairs," she suggested, mostly for the sake of getting some distance to recover from her little… slip.

He agreed, mostly because he didn't want Fred to start with his ridiculous theories about his time spent alone with Isabelle. "You coming?"

"You go on. I'll be right down after you," she stated.

George nodded. "Later, then," he replied, making way to the stairs before he stopped himself and turned back around. "You know, with all of us in here until boxing day… this is gonna be a pretty interesting Christmas, don't you think?"

Oh, he had no idea, she thought, swallowing hard.

**A/N: Well, I hope you liked this epically large chapter. Oddly, there's even more to it and so many deleted scenes I lost count. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	57. Fast Tracking

**A/N: And it's a new record! 13k... I think I won't say anything more about this matter. I hope you like the chapter - I had to stick a lot of content into it because I sort of couldn't put it elsewhere... apologies in advance if it feels somehow disjointed because of that. **

**25 December 1997**

"No," Mia firmly told her husband.

"But…"

"_No._"

"Aw, Mia," he whined as he stood opposite her, the look of a kid begging for sweets all over his face. "Come on… it's just a shower!"

She rolled her eyes. Of course he'd say that. "Yes, it's just a shower. One you're going to take _on your own_," she told him, patting his cheek with a smile on her lips.

"But I'll be lonely on my own. Plus, if you came along, we'd save time and water… isn't there a drought going on? I'm pretty sure I heard something about a drought…"

"On your brain, maybe," she replied, exasperated. "There's no drought, Sirius Black and if there was one, us showering together would only serve to make it worse. I know you all too well – there'd be no water or time-saving coming from it."

"Why would you ever think…?"

"Really? You're trying to tell me there's absolutely no hidden purpose behind you so vehemently insisting I take a shower with you? Because if there isn't, by all means, let us take that shower… provided you swear it on your children's souls."

He gulped at that. "Well, I wouldn't say… the word 'absolutely' is so _definitive_… and I just don't like to gamble on souls, especially our kids'… hey, don't give me that look!" he told his wife when he saw her regarding him with a clear 'I knew it' look on her face. "Is it so wrong for a bloke – a married bloke, by the way – to hope he'll get to make love to his wife in the shower on Christmas Morning? Christmas, love!"

"It is wrong if it'll make us late… again," she told him. "On Christmas morning of all days. You do remember what we do on Christmas Morning, don't you?"

"I know what I want to do…"

"We get up early so we can enjoy the day the most we can, we have breakfast together, we open presents, we spend time as a family…" she provided. "Don't _you _want to do that?"

He narrowed his eyes at his wife. She was good. She was very good. And, frustratingly, that just made him want her more. "You are a cruel woman," he told her.

"Hum, hum," she mumbled, reaching for her dressing gown on a nearby chair. "I wouldn't be surprised if there was a lump of coal with my name on it downstairs."

"Oh, good thing you wouldn't," he assured her a bit moodily. "That way you won't be too disappointed."

She smiled as she put the dressing gown on and made her way over to him, placing her arms around his neck when she found herself close enough. He was just too adorable when he looked like a disappointed little kid.

"You know, you're sort of sending mixed signals here…" he mumbled.

She chuckled. "Happy Christmas, Sirius," she told him, reaching to place a soft kiss on his lips and ending it before he had a chance to turn it against her.

He gave her a look that clearly called her a 'cruel woman' once more, but didn't make him refrain from wrapping his arms around her waist, pulling her closer. "Happy Christmas, Love," he replied, resigned. "Last chance to change your mind."

She smiled. "Ask me again tomorrow. Maybe the day after as well," she offered.

"Oh, I'll hold you to that. Believe me," he assured her.

She laughed. "I'll be waiting," she told him, letting go of him and taking a step back. "Now get in that shower, lonely as it is, because I'm going after."

"Why don't you go first then?" he asked innocently.

Mia narrowed her eyes. "Because I know you'll play dirty if I do."

He looked a little disappointed. "Cruel, _cruel_ woman," he called her just before stepping into the loo and closing the door behind him.

His wife smiled to herself. She'd missed those… her husband's little games. She'd missed him. Spending so much time away from him – first during his Azkaban years and now during his exile from Hogwarts – had shown her just how much impact he had in her life: he could lighten up her world like no one else ever had or ever would. He could make even the saddest moment into bearable ones. Like that Christmas – she'd been half expected to spend every waking moment of it mulling over the fact that Harry was Merlin-knew-where. To be truthful, she still spent quite a deal of time thinking of that but she had managed to enjoy the season nevertheless, mostly thanks to her husband and Arthur Weasley's arrangement that had brought the redheaded family into Grimmauld Place to share it with them. Between all of them, a decent amount of Christmas spirit had been salvaged, although said amount unfortunately hadn't been enough to stop Molly from breaking into waterworks twice the previous night – once _during _Christmas Dinner –, causing her to spent some good fifteen minutes alternating between sobbing on hers and Lulu's shoulder over the fact that she had to wonder if she's ever see Ron again.

Still sighing over the memory, Mia stepped out of the room in order to check on her youngest children. Alex's room was already empty, which didn't surprise her since the boy was quite the early riser and was likely already serving as a surrogate for Molly's motherly affections. So, after tidying up the blankets on her son's bed a little, Mia moved on to little Mary's room.

That one was clearly not unoccupied. Having served her parents with a Christmas present in the shape of three hours to get her to go to sleep the previous night, it seemed the little girl had decided to sleep in that morning – that was, until an unknown amount of minutes before as, instead of screaming bloody murder for an adult to come and spring her, young Mary Black stood holding herself up by the cot's railing, eyeing the structure as if she was trying to find a way to escape on her own. To be fair, Mary did look at everything that way those days – like she was trying to figure out everything about it… more often than not before she gave up and instead tried to eat it. Babies did that kind of thing.

When she spotted her mother at the doorway, though, Mary smiled, lifting up her little arms, already asking to be picked up, which seemed to cause her to lose her balance and fall on her bum. The baby looked quite surprised by it, not having foreseen the connection between letting go of the railing and falling down.

Mia chuckled as she approached the cot. "Haven't quite mastered your balance yet, have you, my little darling?" she said with a smile as she reached down to pick up the little girl settling her on her hip before placing a kiss on her soft cheek. "That's okay. Even grown-ups fall down sometimes – some more than others like your auntie Tonks – but you've got a decent excuse since you're not going to be one until next week."

Mary looked up at her like she was all ears, a small frown forming on her face, even though her mother was quite sure she wouldn't have understood half of what she was saying.

She brushed the soft brown curls on her daughter's head, sighing. "Today is a special day for you, you know?" she continued. "It's your first Christmas. One year ago you were still in Mummy's tummy." _One year ago everything was different_. The thought brushed through her mind for a single second before she banished it, deeming it too depressing for the occasion. "Alright, little princess, let's get you all dressed up for today, shall we?" she asked the little girl, walking over to the dresser.

Dressing Mary took her a little more than Mia recalled from before the beginning of the term, mostly because the little girl was bigger and more active, kicking and punching as well as rolling around. Afterwards, all dressed up in Christmas themed clothes, Mary seemed like quite the happy baby, giggling randomly before stretching her little arm towards the door like she was trying to reach for it.

"Want to go out there, do you?" she asked the little girl. "Alright, I suppose the two of us can walk around a little while Daddy finishes his shower."

The little girl's face lit up like the sun at the mention of the word 'Daddy'. There was no doubt on Mia's mind that her daughter absolutely adored her father, food-throwing aside. And, while she might drive him completely out of his mind sometimes, the feeling was very mutual. Poor child… she'd have jump through a lot of hoops in order to date one day…

Mia stepped into the hallway with the little girl just as she heard her eldest daughter's voice as well as Ginny's coming from the floor below right before a door was shut. Mary looked around, confused by the fact that she could see no source for the sound around them. "Want to go downstairs say 'hello' to Izzy?" she asked the little girl, who cryptically responded by drooling on her own hand. Mia took it as a 'yes'.

Before she even had a chance to knock on the door leading into her daughter's room, Mia was able to spot her inside sitting cross-legged on her bed already dressed for the day and, apparently, reading a book. Not just any book, Mia noticed, but in fact her sixth-year History of Magic text book. _What on Earth?_ Mia thought, raising an eyebrow.

"Izzy?" she said, knocking softly on the door.

Her daughter looked up, clearly startled at first that someone was standing at her doorway. The she managed a smile. "Oh, hi, Mum. And Mary. Hi. Happy Christmas."

Mia smiled back. "Happy Christmas to you too, honey. What are you doing?"

"Reading up the chapters a certain History of Magic teacher assigned her students to read over the break," Izzy replied, looking pointedly at her.

True enough, she _had_ assigned it to them. But still… "Izzy, I don't think she'll blame you if you leave it for _after _Christmas. She most certainly won't give you any extra credit for doing it on Christmas morning, not that fishing for extra credit is something you'd ever do." She paused for a moment, taking a step closer to her daughter and looking her up and down before pushing the door further closed behind her. "Honey, are you okay?"

Izzy gave her a confused look. "Of course I am – why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, you're sitting alone in your room in Christmas Morning doing homework that's not due for over a week," Mia pointed out.

"Ginny did just step out to take a shower," her daughter informed her.

"Still, Izzy. It's just… odd," she said, sitting on the edge of Izzy's bed and placing Mary on the space between them. The little girl was quick to try and get her hands on the discarded text book, which she would have certainly used as a chew toy, had Izzy not snatched it back so quickly. "You've been getting up at six every Christmas since you were four, yet here you are today in your room at half past eight."

"I'm not a kid anymore, Mum," she pointed out.

"I know, love. But…" It was just uncharacteristic of Izzy to be so passive about Christmas. It could be about Harry – that with him not there, Izzy just didn't feel comfortable with celebrating Christmas the way they used to. But still, Mia doubted it, as Izzy had been more than fine with setting up the tree, which she tended to with him as well. What else was different that year? Aside from the Weas… And just like that, everything clicked – the Weasleys were there that year. And with the Weasleys came _the _Weasley her daughter seemed to have a bit of a crush on. "Izzy… are you… avoiding someone… or something?" Mia asked her.

"Avoiding someone?" Izzy asked a bit too loudly before reaching over for her sister and snatching her to her lap, hoping playing absently with the baby would mask any nervous ticks she might develop. "Of course not. Why would I be avoiding anyone?" She was _not_ avoiding him. George. She wasn't. First, because she had no idea if he was downstairs in the first place; secondly because, even if she was, it wasn't like she was planning to run away from him all day. Just from situations when she might be _completely alone_ with him. Because she didn't trust her stupid brain not to snog the hell out of him – it'd proven itself unreliable enough the previous afternoon. So, in all honesty, she just hadn't been planning to go downstairs until Ginny went along with her because, while she didn't trust her brains to keep a hold on themselves when she and George were alone, she was pretty sure she could find away to keep them under control with a third person in the room. Her sense of self-protection against embarrassment spoke louder.

Mia saw the lie in the denial as soon as it came out. She really did. But, since it rubbed her more as self-denial that as an intentional lie, she let that one slide without a lecture. "Well, I don't see any reason why you should be avoiding anyone. I mean, everyone in this house is either your family or your friend. So what reason could there possibly be for you to avoid family or friends that clearly care for you? Unless something happened…"

"_Nothing happened_," she said, once again too loudly, causing Mary to kick her little legs against her own in protest. At least that time it hadn't been a lie, she thought, sifting her sister. _Thank Merlin_. Mary was so lucky she probably still didn't find any specific appeal in boys. "Wha… what could've possibly happened?"

"I don't know, honey. Sometimes things happen between friends. Like fights or… just confusing moments," Mia told her, picking her words carefully. "But, most of the time, when friends are… good friends, which I'm sure would hypothetically be the case, those fights and those… confusing moments won't make them care for you any less."

It was getting painfully obvious her mother's advice wasn't about a general group of friends. In fact, it was starting to sound like her mother knew _exactly_ what she was talking about. Izzy felt like groaning. She vaguely remembered rambling about George to her mother in an exhausted stupor sometime around the occasion when he'd dragged her out of the Burrow when it had been invaded but she'd been hoping it was a dream. Not that she didn't trust her mother. She just didn't feel like talking about it. Yet apparently she had no control over her tongue when she was sleepy – words-wise, that was. She might want to drink plenty of tea that day to make sure nothing incriminating came out of her mouth in front of George that day. Sometimes she just felt like it was easier to deal with him in magical papyrus form – at least that way she had less chance of embarrassing herself.

"Mum, friends are just friends," she told her mother as Mary, sick of being on her lap, kicked around in frustration.

Mia sighed, starting to get frustrated. It was like talking to herself a couple of decades ago – and she didn't mean that as a good thing. "Izzy, if I'd stuck to that thought twenty years ago like I tried to, you wouldn't be here today."

Izzy stared at her mother for a good thirty seconds while Mary squirmed before saying anything. "That… I don't… We…"

"Ma!" the two of them suddenly heard Mary saying, both of their heads snapping around to stare at the little girl, who seemed to be stretching her arms at Mia, waiting to be picked up by her mother.

"Oh, oh," Mia said, lifting the little girl onto her lap. "Was that a word, honey? Was that 'Mama'?"

"Ma!" Mary repeated, trying to reach for her mother's face with her chubby arms.

"Oh… my baby," she said, reaching to place several kisses on the baby's cheeks.

"Dad's gonna be bummed he wasn't here," Izzy pointed out, rather glad Mary's talking had encapsulated her mother's attention, preventing a conversation she wasn't ready for from happening.

"Bummed about what?" she suddenly heard her father asking as he unceremoniously stepped into the room, fully dressed for the day but with his hair slightly damp from the shower.

Izzy raised her eyebrows at him. "Eavesdropping, Dad? How very teenage girl of you."

"You'd know about that, wouldn't you?" he cheekily replied. "Anyway, what am I supposed to be bummed about?"

"That you missed Mary's first word for about thirty seconds," she stated.

At first, Izzy noticed that Sirius looked confused for a short moment. Then, after that, it took about a second too long for him to seem surprised. "Really? What did she say?" he asked, slightly too enthusiastically. Something was up – Izzy knew it was.

"She said 'Ma'. I think it meant Mama… or do you think it might've just been a random sound?" Mia said, too wrapped up on the little girl to notice any odd behaviour on her husband.

Sirius shook his head, grinning. "I doubt it. Mary here is a smart little bugger," he said, reaching to tickle the not-yet one-year-old.

"Yes, she is," Mia agreed, smiling widely at her daughter. She'd been so certain she'd miss it. That by being away she'd miss all those milestones like the first step or the first word. But she hadn't. At least not all of them… she couldn't think of a better Christmas present at the moment.

"I guess in a few months we'll be crossing our fingers for her to shut up," Sirius observed with a grin. "What is this, anyway? All my girls conferencing in the same room… is this some sort of meeting to plan my demise and get all my money?"

"Dang… you caught us, Dad," Izzy replied in a mock-embarrassed tone. "There goes that cot made out of gold that Mary was planning to buy with her share of the inheritance."

Sirius clicked his tongue. "Bet it was all her idea, wasn't it? I did always know one of you kids would be the death of me. All those smiles and that cooing… it was all a play, wasn't it, Miss Mary?" Sirius asked the baby, who hid her face against her mother's neck with a giggle. "Where's the other male specimen inhabiting this house, anyway? Why isn't he here protecting his father from his harpies of a mother and sisters?"

"I imagine he's downstairs being spoiled by Molly," Mia informed him.

"Ah… would rather be coddled by some redhead than to save his father," Sirius concluded, shaking his head in disapproval. "The shame…"

"Well, don't worry… since you've found us out this time, I guess it'll be a few months before we can go back to planning your demise," Mia told him, getting up from her daughter's bed and handing Mary over to her husband. She placed a kiss on his cheek before excusing herself. "Well, I'd better get into the shower. You might want to give her breakfast now before she gets cranky," she told her husband before smiling at little Mary. "Can you say 'Ma' again for Mama?" Mary just gave her a blank look in return, making Mia sigh. "Oh, well, maybe next time." And, with that, she made her exit.

Left alone with her father and sister in the room, Izzy used the opportunity to shoot him an accusatory look.

"What?" he asked when he noticed it.

"That wasn't really her first word, was it?"

He shot her a look of shock but, once again, it took a second too long to form. "Why would you possibly…?"

"It took you a little too long to look surprised, Dad," she informed him. "Just like it took you a little too long to look shocked right now. So, was it? I won't tell Mum."

Sirius eyed her for a few seconds before saying anything. "Mary and I made a deal. We've decided that her first word would be whatever the hell she said first in front of your mother. So, for all intents and purposes, her first word took place today and was 'Ma'." Which sounded far better than the real first word she'd said… 'damn'. Or something similar enough. It had taken him days to get her to stop it and even then he still wasn't sure it wasn't still there somewhere. He was pretty much dead if she said it in front of Mia. She'd made him sleep on the sofa when Alex had said something along those lines.

"And if she hadn't said anything while Mum was home?" Izzy asked.

Sirius paused. "Hadn't really thought of that, to be honest. But, anyway, your mother can never hear of this. It'd break her heart to know that she missed the real thing." Although, given the word it was, he imagined she was much better off with that one.

"I've already told you I wouldn't tell, didn't I?"

Her father smiled. "Good girl. Now, let's get this little one fed. You coming along, Izzybel?"

"I was actually waiting for Ginny."

"What for? It's not like she doesn't know her way down. And why is there a _text book_ on your bed on Christmas morning?" he said, having just spotted it. "Are you trying to get grounded, young lady?"

Izzy chuckled. "Merlin, if studying on holidays will get me grounded, I wonder what would happen to me if I ever made Head Girl."

"Disowning, obviously," he told her unceremoniously. "I'd have my bags packed the moment I got the badge, if I were you. Same to you, Miss Mary," he told the baby on his arms.

"Well, _that_ is unconditional love," his eldest daughter commented as she got up from the bed.

"It's for your own good, Izzybel. No child of mine is allowed to be some stuffy goody two-shoes," he stated firmly starting to walk out of the room.

"Oh, so if I went out there and started dating some tattooed freak who lends a hand to You-Know-Who on Sundays, that would be just fine," she pointed out as she followed him.

Sirius stopped on his tracked. "_Dating?_"

The fact that he'd taken issue with her dating at all instead of just with the horrid description of a potential boyfriend should have probably freaked her out a lot. They'd had that discussion before – that him frowning upon her dating was just ridiculous since she was neither a child nor completely demented. Still, she supposed the fact that it had been over a year since she'd dated anyone had probably allowed him to slip back into that blissful world where Izzy just didn't care about boys at all. Which – she unsuccessfully tried to brand that fact as unfortunate – couldn't be farther away from the truth as the previous day and many other occasions featuring George Weasley came to mind. "Do you really want to discuss this _again_ on Christmas morning, Dad?"

Sirius just grunted in response, turning away from her and starting telling her sister that she wouldn't be allowed to date until she was forty. _Yeah… like that's going to happen_, she told herself as they reached the first floor. Her good old overprotective Dad…

"Oi, Izzy!" She nearly jumped out of her skin at the voice that called her name before noticing that she hadn't _actually _been called by her name. Well, her full name, at least, which that voice recurrently called her by. She turned on her heel to face the source of it and spotted the Weasley in question through the living room's doorway, sitting on the sofa with his father. She was pretty sure that one was Fred – not fully sure since she couldn't see all the 'tells' yet but about 80%. "Happy Christmas, good morning, blah, blah… more pleasantries… blah. Anyway, Dad needs help with the telly," he told her.

"Oh, okay… and likewise on the pleasantries," she mumbled before stepping into the room, her father after her. "I'll just…"

"Sure. You stay here while _I _go on to the kitchen with the daughter who doesn't try to drive her father out of his mind," he told her.

"Funny," maybe-Fred said. "Didn't you say the other day at the shop when you looked like you hadn't slept since the beginning of the decade…?"

"_Regardless_ of what I said or looked like," Sirius said quickly. "This one's a hundred times worse," he said, nodding at Izzy.

"Wow. And I wasn't even trying," she commented. "Wonder what happens when I am…"

"Aren't you supposed to be helping with the telly, Izzybel?" he asked, trying to deflect the conversation. "Kids these days…" he mumbled as he walked away.

Izzy shook her head as she approached the sofa. "So, what's wrong?" she asked, only afterwards noticing the screen on the telly was blue.

"No idea. Dad was experimenting with this black thing and the whole screen went blue," maybe-Fred stated, showing her the remote.

"Oh, let me just take that," she said, reaching for the object and fiddling with the buttons until the screen was filled with cartoons of yellow-coloured people walking around. "There. Done."

"Ah, fantastic!" Mr. Weasley said, excitedly. "George and I tried to get it back to normal for more than ten minutes but nothing would work.

Had he just said 'George'? "Er… George?" she asked out loud, staring at the alleged George. Maybe Mr Weasley meant that George had been there earlier because, now that she was near enough to see him up close, Izzy was about 99% sure it was Fred sitting on her sofa.

"Yep," the younger redhead declared. Or rather lied, she was sure.

She stared some more – he was clearly up to something. "Okay…" she mumbled hesitatingly, walking over to sit by his side on the sofa. She couldn't help wondering what they were trading identities for. It was probably some sort of game – that seemed like the sort of thing they'd do.

Oblivious to the matter, Mr Weasley observed the cartoons on the telly from his armchair with childlike wonder, which _was_ something_,_ as that was far from the first time he saw a television working, let alone _that _television. "Amazing," the older man mumbled as he got up from his seat to observe the colourful broadcast closer. "Just amazing, these Muggles."

Seeing her best friend's father far too lost in his wonder to have any notion of his surroundings, Izzy found that opportunity as good as any to question Fred. "Alright, what are you and George up to really?"

Fred eyed her with a (remarkably good) forced look of confusion. "You must mean Fred and I."

"_No_," she replied. "I do mean you and George. And don't bother convincing me you're not Fred. You know you are."

The redhead looked completely lost. "How can you possibly tell? You ran into him, didn't you? He blabbed."

"He didn't blab. I didn't even see him yet today," she assured him.

"Then how?"

Izzy shrugged. "Ginny told me about this 'tell' you have. Then I started to notice some others of my own."

"Such as…"

She rolled her eyes. "If I told you, I'd lose the upper hand."

"Come on – it's just one," he insisted, eyeing his father to make sure he was still far too distracted with the telly to hear. "What gave me away today?"

She could have kept her mouth shut – hell, she probably should have. It wasn't like he had that whole effect George had on her that made her spill all sorts of stuff she wasn't planning to. But still, she said it. She'd always wonder why – maybe it was her brain betraying her again. "You called me Izzy."

"So? Everyone does."

"Not George."

Fred seemed confused. He could safely say he had _never _noticed anything of that sort. "Since when? How have I never noticed him call you by some weird nickname?"

"He doesn't call me by a nickname – he just calls me by my name."

"What name?"

"You do know that _Izzy_ is the nickname, right? My name is actually Isabelle," she stated.

"So George always calls you Isabelle?" he asked, surprised. She nodded in response. "How have I _never _noticed that?"

She shrugged. "I guess it's not a really big deal…"

Fred responded to that by raising his eyebrows. That was far from _not _a big deal. George didn't just do things for the sake of doing them – there was usually a reason behind them. The two single reasons Fred could think of for his twin brother to call Isabelle Black by her given name had to be: 1. Annoying her; 2. Trying to feel like less of a creep for liking her by calling her by a name that would imply an increased degree of… maturity on her. Fred was inclined to hope for the second. "So, you did say you noticed a few more 'tells'… what would it cost me to get you to share them?" He was curious to hear what differences Izzy had noticed between him and George – since most people (including his own father) more often than not couldn't tell them apart, her noticing those 'tells' had to mean she looked more their way (George's, particularly) than most people did.

She might have said a lot of things. How their freckles had different patterns, how Fred always spoke just a fraction of an octave higher than George, how Fred tended to go to the most obvious and broad jokes while George stuck with more complex ones, how George's grin was just a little softer than his twin's… she could have said that and much more. Still, that time she had enough sense to refrain herself, knowing how obvious that would make her crush. "I don't really think anything's worth giving up this leverage on you two."

"_And what leverage would that be_?"

The two of them turned to the door to find George casually coming into the room.

"Shh…" Fred whispered as he nodded warningly at their father, who was apparently still in the room… though solely in a physical sense as his mind seemed too lost on inspecting the wiring behind the telly, at which he looked at as if he really wanted to take it apart.

George raised his eyebrows at that as he approached them but didn't really comment on it. "Well? Leverage?" he asked them.

"It seems, brother, that _Isabelle_ knows a number of ways to tell us apart – which, by the way, she's already done today – but refuses to share them," Fred accused her.

"Aw, Isabelle. Where's your Christmas spirit?" he asked her, more playful than annoyed. Honestly, it didn't really bother him she could tell them apart. In fact, it made him a little proud. He didn't want to think too much about the 'why' behind that.

"My Christmas spirit is just fine, thank you very much, just as is my common sense," she informed him with a smile. "Would _you _give up on such good leverage?"

George didn't reply. "Well, it sort of doesn't matter now. We've got to abort this play, Fred. Mum knows."

"Oh, come on – don't tell me she's in on this 'tell' thing too!"

"I'm sure she must know plenty of tells too – it's _Mum_, isn't it? She knows everything. But this time I sort of had to spill the beans."

Fred gaped at him. "What? Why?"

"Well," George started, eyeing his father to make sure he was not paying attention – and wondering if he shouldn't worry that the bloke was so close to the telly it might fry his brains, "she found a few – how should I put it? – make-up related stains on the _inside_ of your clothes while she was cleaning our room. Safe to say she wasn't happy about it and, as much as I love you as my favourite brother, I draw the line at hearing lectures about the weird stuff you and Angie do to each other." Especially when he hadn't been shagged in a while… a pretty long while. "Oh, by the way, she asked me to tell you to meet her upstairs in the room we're staying in."

The gape on Fred's face became sheer panic. "Crap. Oh, crap. Why does Angelina have to keep wearing that cheap Muggle lipstick that leaves stains on everything? Mum will _kill_ me."

"Probably not," George argued. "Being Christmas, she wouldn't want to make the holidays bloody or anything. Plus, we're guests in someone else's house, so killing you here would be terribly rude."

"Oh, please," Izzy interjected. "Don't worry about politeness – we did tell you to make yourselves at home. Plus, I don't think Kreacher has problems with cleaning crime scenes."

The redhead grinned at her, glad she was playing alone. "Well, if that's the case, then it was nice to meet you, Fred."

Fred glared. "You know, I'm a sucker for jokes but that one… that one just wasn't funny."

"It was funny to me," Izzy pointed out.

"Well, that's because the two of you are just…" He stopped himself, wondering if finishing that sentence was a good idea. It probably wasn't since he'd just been about to point out the fact that they were bloody perfect for each other. George would kill him if he said that or at the very least be furious. Honestly, he'd rather that didn't happen.

"Just what?" he heard Izzy asking.

He huffed, and eyed both of them. "Never mind," he mumbled, giving George a look at the same time he got up, aware of the subtext that sent his brother's way – hell, he wanted him to have the subtext. "Now, if you excuse me, I have to go to Mum and hope I find a good excuse for what she found on my way up."

With that, he made his way out, leaving Izzy and George to watch him walking away with high eyebrows.

"Well, that was fun," George mumbled.

"It was," Izzy agreed with a chuckle. "Lipstick? Really? No chance that's some joke of yours?"

"Oh, I wish it was a joke… or that there was a way for me to un-think the things I thought when Mum told me about it," he said with a disgusted look as he moved to take the seat his brother had been occupying by Izzy's side.

"Well, there are memory charms," she offered, trying not to think of how close he was to her at the moment.

"What? And risk my sanity over these two? Not worth it."

"What were you two trading places for, anyway?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Because it's fun. Plus, Mum gets annoyed when we do it at home."

"And doing it here would get her less annoyed?" she asked sceptically.

"No. But as long as she's annoyed at us, she's not mulling over Ron not being around," George pointed out.

"Oh," she mumbled. She wasn't sure whether that was a noble reason behind the whole role-switching play or a simple way for him to justify it just for the sake of feeling better with himself. She didn't ask, anyway. "Well, before you ask, I'm not telling you the 'tells' either, just so you know."

He raised his eyebrows. "You mean there are more of them than the freckle thing?"

She looked confused. "I told you about that?"

He nodded. "Last summer. But there are more, aren't there?"

Why was she even surprised she'd told him? He could probably make her spill her deepest, darkest secrets if he tried really hard… which, at the moment, mostly involved information about Harry's quest and the fact that she had it bad for him. But, hell, that couldn't go on, could it? She needed to learn to keep her mouth shut at will around him. Starting at that moment. "That's for me to know and you to never find out."

George eyed her for a second. "You know I'll get it out of you, right? Maybe it won't be today but one of these days, Isabelle, you'll sing it like a bird."

He might just be right… but she was going to put up a fight to stay quiet. "Oh, forgive me if I lay down while I wait for that to happen," she replied. "Because forever is a long time to wait up."

He grinned, rolling his eyes as he turned to look at his father again – the man looked like a fly obsessed with a lamp, only the lamp was actually a telly in that case. He made a mental note to talk to Fred about finding a way to give him one of those the following Christmas since it was a bit too late on that one. "Having fun, Dad?" he asked.

"Phenomenal, those Muggles," the older man said as he stared at the yellow people moving around on the screen, kneeling far too close to it for his eyes not to be uncomfortable. "Getting draws to move around _without _magic. Simply phenomenal. I couldn't help noticing the set isn't connected to elektritity," he said, misspelling the last word before turning to Izzy. "You don't happen to know how it manages to work anyhow, do you, Izzy?"

She shrugged. "I think it's some sort of spell. You might get more information from Lulu – she's the one who set it up."

"She was?" he asked, surprised.

Izzy nodded. "Her father was a Muggle – she grew up mostly dependant on Muggle gadgets. If you walked into her current flat, you'd think she wasn't magical at all."

"Oh, how curious! I wonder if she's up yet."

"She is – I heard her chasing Alex around down on the ground floor," George provided.

"Ah, lovely, I think I'll go ask her now while your mother doesn't call us for breakfast."

George chuckled, thinking of his mother lecturing Fred upstairs. "Oh, take your time. She's a bit busy at the moment."

Izzy snorted as Mr Weasley excused himself, completely oblivious to what his son meant.

"It's amazing how awestruck he gets by all the Muggle stuff," George observed once his father was out of the room.

"Well, Muggles do it all without magic – like it or don't like it, the things they still manage to come up with are pretty impressive that way," Izzy pointed out

"Say that to Dad and you've got a friend for life," he replied. "You're pretty good at that whole Muggle stuff, aren't you?" he asked after a few seconds

She shrugged. "I guess. Why do you ask?"

"Nothing in particular. Just something I was thinking. I mean, you know how to operate a television, you constantly correct me when I misspell words about Muggle things, you successfully managed to get to the shop via underground last Summer…"

"I got a bit lost that time," she pointed out.

"Yeah, but you got there in the end," he replied. "Have I ever told you about mine and Fred's first and only venture into the underground?"

She raised her eyebrows. "No." But it was already sounding interesting…

"Well, it was last Easter. We were going to King's Cross to welcome Ginny home from school and decided it would be fun to try to mingle with the Muggles. Plus, it'd be a fun thing to tell Dad about," he added. "So, we traded some Muggle money, found the nearest station and got tickets. It was supposed to be just three of four stations or something but – don't ask me how we did it – somehow we ended up miles away, by that place where the flying buses land."

"The airport?"

"Exactly. We didn't even notice until we got there."

"How? Didn't you see you were stopping on about a dozen more stations than you were supposed to… and probably heading the wrong way too? What line did you take?"

"Line? I dunno – we got into the first train we saw!"

"Well, no wonder you got lost, then! Were you expecting the train to magically know where you were headed to?"

"Hey! Don't judge us. I'd like to see a Muggle sort through the Floo Network," he replied.

He did have a point there, Izzy had to give him that. "Well, but didn't Professor Burbage teach you this kind of thing?"

"No. We didn't take Muggle Studies," he replied. "We took Care for Magical Creatures and Divination instead."

"Divination? What did you want Divination for?"

"I dunno – we were hoping to be there when Trelawney lost her marbles for good. Plus, it was kind of fun making up dreams for those journals she made us write. She predicted Fred and I would die before the end of the year on our first term with her. I think it always bugged her that we didn't eat it after all – she always looked at us weirdly afterwards," he stated.

Izzy chuckled. "Well, you should've taken Muggle Studies. It's really fun… well, at least it _was _before Alecto took over. Now all they teach us is crap about how evil Muggles are and how they would decimate us if they could, so it's perfectly fine if we beat them to it. And you know what's the best part of it? We're supposed to write a massive essay on how horrible they are and how they should be massacred. Muggles, that is."

"Bet your head's bursting with inspiration," George joked.

"It is. I literally get up at night to write line after line of flawless text," she said sarcastically. "Maybe I'll just give up and take the detention. She promised it'd be pretty horrid but I'm sure I won't be the only one there, so that might make it a little bit better."

He gaped at her. "Are you mad? You're not going to get yourself detention!" he said, all signs of humour having vanished from his face.

"Says the bloke who got it all the time."

He huffed. "For Merlin's sake, do I even need to say this?" he said under his breath. "I got detention with McGonagall, with Flitwick, with Sprout… even with Snape before he went evil," he paused, watching as Izzy gave him a doubtful look, "alright, _this _openly evil. But anyway, I got detention with allegedly normal teachers, not murderous lunatics posing as such. They'll torture you if they know they can get away with it. You know that."

She let out a frustrated sound. "How do I write that thing, then? Just trying to come up with the words would make anyone with a little bit of decency sick!"

"Then don't come up with the words," George replied.

She eyes him oddly. "Now you're just not making any sense."

"That's because you're not thinking outside the box – do you realize that you've got a perfectly hateful portrait up in your attic that I am yet to mail to the Malfoys?"

"Are you suggesting that I ask Phineas to write the essay for me? Because, let me tell you, I don't really think that works with dead people."

"I'm not telling you to ask him to write it for you – I'm telling you to use him as inspiration."

"Oh, come on! He'll never help me with homework!"

"Then don't tell him it's homework. Just ask him why he thinks Muggles are the worst thing to ever happen in the world and I'm sure he'll have plenty to say – I bet by the end of it you'll have more than enough for two essays," he observed before eyeing her and seeing she still didn't look quite comfortable. "Look, I know it sucks that they're making you write this thing in the first place but you do what you have to do when you have no other choice. Just write it down, deliver it knowing you don't believe a word of it and don't think any more of it. It's not like it's going to make anyone's feelings towards Muggles any worse, least of all theirs."

He did have a point there. The Carrows simply couldn't get any nastier than they already were. "Thanks. I guess that's what I'll have to do."

"No one will think any less of you for it – no one with brains, at least. I know that I won't," George assured her. "And if you want some company to help you endure Phineas' idiocy…"

"Oh, don't worry about that. I'll take Ginny," she said quickly before he even had a chance to offer. Thinking back to the previous day, it was easy enough to conclude that going back into that attic alone with George was just mad. She didn't trust herself to endure that without jumping him. She barely trusted herself to be alone in a room with him in case her brain decided to play tricks on her which, thank Merlin, it wasn't at the moment. Well, not very much, at least. Yet, she was still wondering how her plans _not _to be left alone in a room with him – which seemed to be the case at the moment – had been shot to hell… "She needs the material too, anyway," she justified. "Plus, Mum probably won't like us going up there, so it wouldn't hurt if you stayed down here and covered for us."

George shrugged. "If that's what you want…" he mumbled. "But make sure Ginny takes her Christmas present up with her. It'll be a lot easier to catch everything he says if you use it."

"Use it? What sort of present is that?"

The redhead chuckled. "One of those Self-Writing Quills."

"A Quill? You gave your sister a quill for Christmas?" she asked, chuckling.

"It's lame, I know, but she brought it on herself. It's a bit of a joke, you see? Gin-Gin kept complaining that, since you and I write to each other until so late at night, she now has to take all the notes during the first morning classes because you're pretty drowsy. Which, I gather, she's exaggerating because you'd have told me to leave you alone if you felt like you needed to go to sleep, right?"

Wrong, Izzy thought. More often than not, she was so caught up on their conversations, she could easily see herself letting them go on until dawn. And, yes, sometimes she was a bit… absent in mornings. But she didn't want him to know _that_ because, as sleepy as she was, she _needed _those conversations and last thing she wanted was for him to avoid them because he thought they made her tired. "Of course," she lied with conviction. "She's probably just trying to annoy you."

He rolled his eyes. "Of course she is. Well, anyway, to get her to shut up about that, I thought I'd just give her a Self-Writing Quill and solve the problem. I can't wait to see her face when she opens the package."

Izzy smiled. "Maybe she'll get a laugh out of it."

"Good. She needs it – she's been going around like someone's just killed her puppy. Do you know what's up with her? She's usually a blast around Christmas."

She looked down for a second and shook her head. "She wants space and I'm giving it to her. For now. I know that I owe her but if this doesn't get better anytime soon, screw the space because I'm getting it out of her."

George nodded. "You do that and let me know if it doesn't work. Fred and I are perfecting this tongue-loosening sweet – if everything goes as planned, it'd make Madam Malkin spill the measurements of all her clients," he said with a chuckled. "But, anyway, since we were circling the matter of Christmas presents, I'd say it's about time you got to opening yours."

"Mine?" she asked, her heart stopping for a full second. "You got me a present?"

"Yep."

She stared at him for a second, unsure of what to say. "George! What did you get me a present for?" she managed to say, feeling slightly embarrassed. "You knew I wouldn't get the chance to find anything for you." She'd thought of it – she'd tried it. But having been locked up at Hogwarts until the 23rd and not being allowed to leave the house since then sort of made it hard for one to go Christmas shopping. Especially when the only shops accepting Owl orders these days were the Apothecary, the Cauldron Shop and Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes (which, while interesting, completely lost its appeal when one was shopping for the owner, of all people).

"I don't need anything," he stated.

"Well, neither do I," she countered.

"Oh, but you might just need your present. Go on, Isabelle. Fetch it – it's under the tree. The little one wrapped with the shop's paper."

"Hey! What am I? A dog?"

"Your Dad is… technically. I imagine the apple wouldn't fall too far away from the tree if you ever tried to go animagus," George observed. "Now, don't stall. Go get it. What use is it wrapped up under a tree?"

She raised her eyebrows at him before letting out a long breath. "Alright. Thank you," she gave in as she got up, only to stop a second later. "Am I going to regret thanking you in advance later?"

"Painfully," he assured her with a mock-serious look on his face.

She rolled her eyes as she walked over to the tree, fetching the one matching George's earlier description. She eyed it scrupulously as she made her way back to the sofa and ignored George's cocky little chuckle, probably mocking her expression. "Don't you dare move away while I open this," she said, occupying her previous seat. "If it explodes on my face, I want you to be on the blast radius."

"How generous of you," he commented dryly.

"What can I say? Christmas makes me mellow," she replied, pulling the bow and uncovering the little box. Well, she thought just as she spotted the little object inside, she couldn't say he wasn't full of surprises. Izzy reached into the box and got a hold of the little glad vial inside of it. The little vial with just a few drops of liquid at the bottom of it. "It looks… interesting," she mumbled.

"It looks like a joke," he countered. "It isn't, trust me."

"What is it, then? Perfume?"

"For all intents and purposes, yes. Between just the two of us, no," he told her.

"What?"

"It's disguised as perfume. The colour, the smell… it'll fool anyone who searches your bags for sure. But don't worry, you can turn it back to the real form with a simple charm-breaking spell. It only works if you do it, though. We made it so it wouldn't otherwise," he explained

"What can this possibly be that would require so much fuss to hide it?"

"Felix Felicis."

She stared at him in disbelief. "Come again?"

"It's Felix Felicis. Liquid luck, drink it and…"

"I know what Felix Felicis is! And I sure know how it works. Where did you get it from? Did you brew it yourself?"

George snorted. "Well, Fred and I tried but it didn't go very well. We flipped a coin and Fred ended up as the test subject – the memories of that day have caused him to refuse flipping coisns for anything ever since. One drop in and a cross breeze caused a door to shut on his face, which, of course, was not long before he tripped and fell down the stairs: on one hand, he was lucky because he was about five steps away from the ground floor, so no broken bones; on the other hand, he fell straight on Verity just as Angelina was coming in. Let's just say it didn't look good and Angie made her feelings known on that matter. Loudly and violently. So, no, Isabelle, I assure you Fred and I didn't brew that particular dose of Felix Felicis."

"Who did it, then? Slughorn?"

George shook his head. "He refuses to brew it anymore – McGonagall said so during an Order meeting. He's afraid it'd get on the wrong hands – even had Sprout hide this crazy rare ingredient so they couldn't make him do it."

"So how did you get it?"

"Well, actually we didn't. You did," he told her. "Technically, it's re-gifting, which is a bit lame, but well…"

She looked confused for a moment before it dawned on her – having stolen Slughorn's stash at the end of the previous school year. "But how did you…? We used it all up! I gave the last of it to my dad."

George shook his head. "You gave some of it to Hermione for her to give Ron, remember? Well, he had his share and there was still a bit left afterwards, which he handed over to Fred and I when we ran into him so we'd drink it too."

"Then why is it still inside the bottle?"

He shrugged. "It was our first real battle – we didn't want to spoil it be winning through cheating."

"Cheating? It was a bloody battle, George! What fun would it be to come out of it dead?"

"Well, we didn't, the Felix was salvaged and we decided to keep it for a rainy day. Now, we're giving it back to you."

"To me? Why? I can't accept this! There's a war going on, George. Plenty of rainy days on the horizon," she stated, unable to understand why he was giving her something his own life might one day depend on.

"Fred and I can deal with rainy days perfectly well, Isabelle."

"So can I!"

He huffed. "I'm sure you can but the difference between us it that while Fred and I are free and pretty safe, all things considered, living in our own flat and not sharing a roof with Death Eaters, you are about to walk back into a school full of then, not to mention Dementors as well. If they come for us, we can run, while you can't because of the school wards. Are you really going to tell me you couldn't use a little more luck, should that occasion present itself? Because I'd say you would and I'd like to know you had it nearby to use, so just quit being stubborn and take it."

"But… what about Fred? Does he agree with this? Wouldn't he want to give it to… I dunno, Angelina?"

"Angelina's on the same boat as ours and Fred knows perfectly well she'd physically hurt him if he even implied she couldn't look after herself. Besides, he – like I do – knows that, as long as you have the Felix with you, Ginny will benefit from it as well. If you don't take it for yourself, do it for her. She's your best friend."

Guilt. Was he using guilt – not to mention his own sister – to get her to bend his way? Because if he was, she was annoyed to admit that he was succeeding. "But… I… you…"

"There's very little of it," he continued, ignoring any protest she might be trying to bring up. "It should serve for about an hour of luck if you split it with Ginny. It's not much but it should be enough to get you out of a potentially sticky situation," he explained. "Now, before you start arguing again, keep in mind that I have a full week to convince Ginny to take the potion herself if you refuse – and, trust me, she will give in, if not for anything else, to get me to stop bugging her – which would make this whole argument between the two of us pointless."

Izzy sighed. She knew a lost battle when she saw one. "I don't know what to say," she whispered.

"Well, 'thank you' would be a nice way to start," he pointed out.

But she didn't say thank you – she put the little bottle back inside the box, placed it on the coffee table to avoid any unintended break and then, avoiding looking him in the eyes as she did so, she leaned forward, wrapping her arms around him in a hug.

If he was surprised, he sure disguised it well because there wasn't a single hint of hesitation in his acceptance. She felt surprisingly comfortable, as opposed to the tense hug she'd pictured right before doing it. That was the thing about him – he could at the same time make her feel nervous beyond description and overwhelmingly comfortable. It was completely irrational.

"Sometimes I wonder if you're not the most frustrating person in the world," she said out loud.

She heard him chuckling against her ear. "Funny – I feel exactly the same every once in a while," he replied, making her smile.

Seconds later, she knew she should have already let go. She would've, really, but she didn't want to. She was scared. Why? Because she knew she was exactly in the right mind-set to go ahead and do something so terribly dumb…

However, she didn't need to think much more about that matter as the sound of someone clearing their throat by the door had her practically jump out of his arms. She was already berating herself for being senseless enough to hug George in room with an open door (through which anyone – her father included – could burst in) when she noticed it was Ginny. _Thank Merlin_, she thought, relieved beyond words.

"Sorry to interrupt but Mum's about done scolding Fred. She told me to tell everyone to get going down to the kitchen for breakfast. She reckons it's about done," Ginny explained.

Izzy nodded immediately, jumping to her feet and avoiding at all cost looking at George. "Right. I'll be right down – just have to upstairs to put… something in a safe place," she mumbled before picking the little box containing the vial up and rushing out of the room as fast as her legs would allow her.

George watched her retreat as he got up himself, his brows far more furrowed than Ginny recalled ever seeing them. The younger redhead quickly moved back to the spot under the doorway she'd been occupying until her best friend had burst through it and stood there, waiting for her brother to approach.

He gave her an inquisitive look when he reached her, noting she was standing on his way. "Are you going to move anytime soon, Gin-Gin?"

Neither did Ginny respond to that, nor did she move an inch. Instead, she cleared her throat after a few seconds. "You know, I've got six brothers and one person I regard as a sister. Take a guess whose arse is going to get kicked if this _thing _crashes and burns."

He just stared at her for a few seconds. "There's nothing here to crash or burn," he said.

"Then look closer, idiot," she told him, rolling her eyes.

And with that, Ginny walked away, leaving her brother planted behind, wondering if her words meant what he thought they meant.

* * *

It was ridiculously late at night or maybe shockingly early in the morning – either way, the only light outside the windows came from streetlights – when Sirius Black had to drag himself out of bed, awoken by his youngest daughter's cries, and follow the unholy sounds into the little girl's room.

"Kid, I thought we were making progress here," he mumbled as he approached the little girl's cot. The kid was still a bit of a nightmare to put to sleep at night but they'd reached a point when she'd usually stay out once she got to sleep. "Don't go thinking Daddy'll come running every time you decided to start crying in the middle of the night, little lady. I'd just rather you didn't wake the whole blo… er, the whole house up." He picked his still-sobbing daughter up from her cot and cradled her against his chest after moving onto the nearby rocking chair.

The little girl's crying subsided gradually as she sucked on her thumb on his lap. In the end, it took him a half hour to soothe her back to sleep, which he supposed wasn't all that bad considering it was Mary. Of course, by the time the little girl was out, he was already very much awake. Awake to the point that he knew going back to bad would only serve to drag Mia into wakefulness too with his tossing and turning…

Groaning he made his way out of the nursery and found himself wondering what he could do to push himself back into a stupor. Stunning himself might work but it was highly advised against by the British Healing Society. Dawning some sleeping drought was also a no-no since neither did he have any ready at the moment, nor did he trust himself or Kreacher to successfully brew some in such a short notice. He supposed he'd just have to wait for drowsiness to come back. Maybe if he went downstairs and watched some of that horrid late-night telly…

He didn't have a chance to even start enduring it, though as, upon reaching the floor below, he noticed there was a light under a room's door. Harry's room.

He froze for a second as his mind was unable not to wonder if the person in the room couldn't somehow be its owner… No, he told himself. The kid was smarter than that – he'd know that coming home around Christmas, of all times, was insane to monumental proportions… Still, he told himself, checking wouldn't hurt.

So, without bothering to knock, he reached to turn the doorknob of the door leading into the room in question and burst inside… only to find not a seventeen-year-old kid who'd just been away on a potentially lethal quest but instead the girlfriend he'd left behind, sitting cross-legged on his bed, staring at him with damp, bloodshot eyes.

Saying she looked quite shocked at having been caught would have been an understatement. "I'm not… I'm not crying," she said, wiping her tears with a sleeve and forcing herself to look away.

He stared at her for a few seconds before saying anything. "Your face begs to differ," Sirius pointed out.

Ginny sniffed. "I've just got something in my…" She stopped, huffing in a clear giving-up fashion. "I'm not one of those girls. The ones that go around crying because they don't know what else to do. I'm not… Cho bloody Chang. I'm just…"

"I know," he said.

"It's weird being here," she mumbled, not sure why she was telling him that at all. "In this house. When he's not here. It feels…"

"…wrong," Sirius finished for her.

Ginny eyed, looked up, eyeing him surprised. "How do you know that?"

"Let's say I'm a bit of an expert in what comes to being apart from people you love," he said before taking a breath and stepping further into the room so he could close the door behind him, giving the girl some more privacy. "Mia used to live in Wales, you know? Before… well, everything. We spent a lot of time together there during school breaks since Lulu was pretty liberal in what came to adult supervision for kids young and in love. Anyway, we made pretty nice memories over there. When I escaped from Azkaban and got on the run, first thing I did was to go there. Not sure why – we had a flat in London right before they carted me off to prison and she'd gone into hiding as well, but I guess I figured after all that time she'd have gone back to her family's home."

"But she hadn't," Ginny provided, knowing at least part of the story.

Sirius shook his head. "She hadn't – she was already here. And being over there without her just didn't feel right after we'd made all those memories together. It made me miss her ten times more than I already did. Safe to say I got out of there as fast as I could, also because the place turned out to be watched by the aurors looking after me. Anyway, my point is that I was at Mia's place for a couple of hours and it made me feel pretty miserable; you've been here for over two days – if you feel like you need to cry alone in his room at who-knows-what-time-it-is o'clock, no one has a right to judge you, least of all me."

The redhead bit on her lip. "Thanks."

He nodded. "You're welcome. I guess I'll just leave you to…"

"Would you have gone along?" she asked. Ever since she'd stepped foot into that house and been flooded with memories and unbearable feelings, a slightly irrational part of her mind had been berating her over and over about not having gone with Harry on his quest. And while logically that part of herself should have been crushed by the fact that, as an underage witch still under the influence of the Trace, she'd only have been dead weight to him on the field, it hadn't. She knew she'd made the right choice and yet… and yet she kept telling herself she shouldn't have. "If it was Mia in Harry's shoes and if you were the underage one, would you have gone after her?"

Sirius had to think for a moment, trying to step into the shoes of his teenage self. Would he have followed Mia then? The answer came easily once he found himself thinking the same way his younger self would. "Yes. Absolutely," he replied, watching as Ginny's face fell a little. "But you shouldn't guide yourself by the things my teenage self would do," he quickly added. "Because, honestly, he was a thoughtless idiot. Which brings me to the point when I should thank Merlin that I'm not and never have been on your shoes. Odds are I would have gotten myself killed, more likely than not gotten on the way countless times and potentially gotten Mia hurt or captured. So don't doubt yourself, Ginny, because you made the right choice and I'm telling you all this the same way I'd tell it to my teenage self in that hypothetical little universe you've just created."

Ginny could tell the irrational part that had been telling her otherwise wasn't completely convinced on the argument but at least, for the first time since she'd came into the house, it had been ridden speechless. She let out a long breath. "Merlin, I can't wait to turn seventeen," she found herself saying out loud before she could stop herself. Realizing what she'd done, Ginny turned to Sirius in alarm. She knew he more than likely would have gotten the implication behind her words… and yet he didn't look half as horrified as she'd expected him to be. In fact, he barely looked surprised. "I… I…"

"Don't worry, Red. I'm not running to tell your mother that you'll have a foot out the door at midnight on your birthday." Of course, he understood the hypocrisy of his statement since he knew that if Izzy was the one wanting to go on a mad quest after her boyfriend, he'd want to know so he could lock her up in a tower in advance. Still, he was pretty partial to Harry – he had no doubt that, wherever he was, his godson had to be just as miserable without his girlfriend as she was without him. For now he could only hope that, if there was any good in that world, by Ginny's birthday in August the whole matter of the war, Death Eaters and the need to be on the run would be far behind them. Or else he was pretty screwed, he thought with a tired huff. _Hell, no need to think of that with months in advance_, he told himself. He ought to focus on the more positive fact that he was starting to feel tired enough to successfully go back to sleep. "Well, I guess it's time I leave you to your thoughts," he excused himself, opening the door back and motioning to step out of the room. "Good night, Ginny."

"Good night," she mumbled in reply before he closed the door back behind him.

He made his way upstairs quietly, not bothering to turn on any lights on his way since he pretty much could walk the whole way backwards and blindfolded without missing a step by then. When he reached his floor, though, he noticed that the lights were on inside his room.

He stepped into it with raised eyebrows, only to find Mia unexpectedly sitting up on the bed while she cuddled their son against her chest, her lips pressed against the top of his head as she whispered little nothings while the little boy held on to his faithful stuffed dog.

Once she spotted her husband coming in, Mia shot him an inquisitor look. "Where were you?" she asked in a whisper. "I woke up and you were gone."

"Mary was crying. You were so down under you didn't even hear it," he told her as he circled the bed to reach his side by the window. "What's up with him?" he asked, nodding at their son.

"He had a nightmare," she said, stroking the young boy's hair. "Came running for Mummy and Daddy, didn't you, honey?"

Alex nodded silently, burying his head deeper into the crook of his mother's arm.

Sirius sighed as he got into the bed as well, sitting up by his wife's side. "That's alright, mate. Whatever it was, you know it's going to have to go through me, Mummy, Izzy, Grandma Lulu, Grandpa Gabe and the Weasleys downstairs to get to you, right? It doesn't stand a chance, kid." His usually curious and talkative son didn't react to his words, instead just remaining cuddled against his mother's chest. Sirius took a breath. "Do you want to stay here with Mummy and Daddy just for tonight?" he asked the little boy, hoping to garner some reaction out of him.

That time, he was successful, as Alex shot him a hopeful look and nodded before saying a low 'Yesh, Daddy' to him. Mia gave him a smile as he lifted the covers and fluffed the pillows together so their son and his stuffed dog would settle themselves on the bed between him and Mia.

Afterwards, he lay looking at his wife, watching as she stroked their little son's hair at the same time she hummed a lullaby under her breath – he'd have been lulled to sleep by it as well if he wasn't so focused on looking at her, taking every single feature in and thanking Merlin she was there and not away, leaving him to miss her like that poor girl downstairs missed her boyfriend.

That was how things were meant to be like, he thought: Mia lying there by his side, lovely in the streetlight-illuminated darkness, calmly cuddling his sleeping son and not miles and miles away surrounded by Dementors and Death Eaters that were never meant to haunt a place as sacred for them as Hogwarts was. He didn't even want to think that, in a week, he'd be back to sleeping without her by his side…

"What is it?" she whispered to him, just noticing his stare after making sure Alex was completely asleep by then.

Her husband shook his head. "Nothing. I was just thinking that I'm glad you're home."

"You've already said that a hundred times," Mia pointed out with a little chuckle.

"So I'll say it another hundred and mean it every time," he promised.

Mia smiled. "You're sweet when you want to," she told him sleepily.

"One of many qualities," he assured her, making her lips curl further.

He wanted to reach across the bed to plant a kiss on those amazing lips but he was afraid that'd only serve to wake Alex back up… the kid just had the worst sense of opportunity to climb into bed with them. So, instead he settled for placing his arm over his son so his hand would find Mia's over the covers. "Happy Christmas, love."

"Hum… t's not Christmas anymore," she mumbled against her pillows, closing her eyes.

"I don't care," he replied. "I love you."

Her lips curled. "Love you too. Now go to sleep like a good boy," she demanded.

He chuckled. "Yes, Mum," he replied before doing what he was told.

Next time he came to himself, he vaguely noted the absence of a pretty wife and a little son in the bed before turning around and going back to sleep just because he could. The time after that one, though, he found himself being shaken awake by Mia, who he found sitting on the edge of the bed. It wasn't the shaking that actually, woke him up, though – it was the concerned look on her face.

"Whazzit?" he slurred, recovering his conscience far too quickly for his taste.

"You need to get up now, Sirius," she told him.

"Why? Is it the kids? Harry? Did something come up?" he asked.

She shook her head. "The kids are fine. So is Harry, as far as I know. But you need to go downstairs, Sirius. There's something you need to see."

He got up in a flash, barely taking the time to go to the loo before catching the dressing gown his wife handed over to him and rushing down the stairs after her. By the time he got into the kitchen, he couldn't even say he recalled half the way down, his motion there having been so… automatic. He vaguely recalled Mia reassuring him on the way that none of their friends had gotten hurt or anything, which was partially confirmed when he noticed Remus – who should have been spending Boxing Day with his wife in Andromeda Tonks's house – was standing in his kitchen as part of the group of about half a dozen heads, half of which were red, surrounding Lulu's spot on the kitchen table. Only later did he realize they were all trying to read the magazine in front of her.

"_Every single article – it's like he's possessed_," he heard one of the twins commenting.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

All of the previously bent heads looked up and turned to him.

"We've lost Xeno Lovegood," Remus declared.

Sirius looked at him in shock for a moment. "He's dead?"

Gabriel shook his head as he got a hold of the magazine on the table. "No, but it seems we've lost him anyway," he declared, handing the magazine to him.

It was the latest issue of the Quibbler… only it didn't seem like the Quibbler at all. While, since the beginning of the full-blown war, the magazine had covered themes from self-defence techniques against Death Eaters to positive messages for those supporting the Order's side, now it looked like a booklet of propaganda for the infiltrated ministry, starting with the cover announcing 'Ten reasons why Harry Potter is the Worst Enemy of the Wizarding World'. "What on Earth is going on with that man? I thought he was on our side."

"He was," Arthur stated. "I've just ran into him last month. He seemed completely on board with us."

"We knew it was only a matter of time before Death Eaters got sick of the Quibbler sticking up for us but I always thought they'd just shut it down, not change it altogether," Fred – recognizable by his F-branded Weasley jumper – stated. "And, believe it or not, Xeno is still the editor. At least it says so here."

"You should read the editorial," Lulu told her son-in-law, "it's puke-inducing."

"Maybe they've imperiused him," Mia suggested from behind Sirius.

"I think at the moment it's irrelevant how they got the Quibbler to turn, Mia," Remus stated. "People on our side will start losing faith if they see that even the magazine that had been boosting them up has turned. Dora nearly lost her mind when she saw this." That reaction might, however, have been highly increased by the uncontrollable pregnancy hormones currently ruling over her body.

Gabriel nodded in agreement. "Remus is right. We need to set things up so they get it from elsewhere."

"What do you suggest? That we start Potterwatch today?" Sirius asked.

Fred shook his head. "No, not today. We need time to spread the word… and the password too."

"Yes, it would be a waste to have you starting up when only a couple of people were listening," Lulu agreed, leaving the table to join her daughter by the door.

"When, then?" Remus inquired. "We need to fast-tack it."

Fred nodded. "You're right," he agreed solemnly. "We need a date. A week from now at the most."

"New Year's eve," George suggested. "No," he corrected himself. "New Year's _Day_. It's when the students are going back to Hogwarts. Death Eaters will be too busy trying to gather who's made a run for it during the holidays – we'll completely sneak up on them. What do you say?"

"Perfect," Fred declared as Remus nodded in agreement.

"Very well-thought," Arthur stated as well. "The subtext to it will be fairly effective too. New year, new rules."

"Alright, then," Sirius agreed, placing the magazine back on the table. "Let's make 1998 a year You-Know-Who will never forget."

**A/N2: Hope you liked the chapter. Now it's time to get back into study-hybernation mode. Feedback is so very welcome! Review!**


	58. Warming Up

**A/N: Apologies for the delay, but between writing an outtake and two chapters (that's right - the next one is about 90% finished) this one was only ready for posting now. I hope it's worth is and that you like it. The huge head start on next one probably means it won't take as long to post it as usual :D**

**29 March 1998**

"Neville, be quiet!" Ginny whispered to her friend as the two of them, along with Izzy, stood with some difficulty inside a cramped broom closet just a few hallways away from the Room of Requirement.

"Me?" the older boy asked, surprised. "I wasn't talking at all!"

"You were breathing. Loudly," Ginny replied.

"Loudly? I don't breathe _loudly_," he mumbled before turning to Izzy. "Do I breathe loudly?"

"Shh," the other girl said as she put out her wand, which she'd been previously using to illuminate the Marauder's Map. "Jugson and Mulciber are coming this way. Not a whisper now."

All three of them went very quiet inside their hiding space, waiting for the two Death Eaters to pass, hopefully without noticing they were there. Those two weren't the sharpest quills in the box but they certainly seemed eager to go the extra mile when it came to getting students on a platter to be served to the Carrows as breakfast. Having been named co-groundskeepers only a couple of weeks before, after Hagrid had been nearly arrested for getting caught holding a 'support Harry Potter party' (which Neville, Ginny and Izzy, as well as a dozen other DA members had narrowly escaped thanks to handful of Peruvian Darkness Powder), Jugson and Mulciber were already responsible for at least a dozen not-so-pleasant Carrow-style detentions, which not even Snape's unwillingness to let Alecto and Amycus have fun had been able to stop. Getting caught by them trying to sneak into the Room of Requirement was definitely not on their plans, especially since that would lead to questions, questions that might lead to answers that might lead to getting their friends already inside the room into quite a bit of trouble.

Standing inside the broom cupboard as uncomfortably as sardines in a can, they heard the two escaped Death Eaters grumbling about the most sordid news of the week as if they were trophies on a shelf while they obliviously walked past them. Neither of them allowed itself to breathe in relief until the voices were so far away they sounded like whispers.

"Are they gone?" Ginny asked Izzy.

The younger girl didn't respond, instead lighting her wand back up so she could check on the map again. "Yeah. The coast is clear. Let's go."

"Finally. My neck is killing me," Neville said, rubbing the back of it as Ginny started to open the door.

"You think that's bad? My back was pressed so hard against the edge of some box I actually lost feeling to my right leg!" Izzy replied, limping out of the cupboard with Ginny's aid.

"Well, sorry. It's not like there was much space for us to move," the redhead mumbled. "Just be thankful you weren't stuck with two people who have the hots for each other like I did when we were sneaking out of Hagrid's. There was far too much touching between Seamus and Lavender and I'm fairly sure 90% of it was on purpose. I seriously considered just turning myself in to the Carrows."

"And he swears he doesn't like her like that," Neville mumbled.

"Yeah, well, idiots do seem to like to tell that to themselves when it comes to _liking _someone, don't they, Izzy?"

Izzy glared. And, just that easily, Ginny had managed to get a completely different conversation to shift into her and George. Again. As time passed and the war got nastier, her best friend seemed to have been getting less and less patient about giving her time to deal with her feelings for George and instead keener and keener on hinting at how dumb she thought Izzy was being by wasting precious time they might not be able to afford losing. "Don't you think this is far from the right time to be talking about feelings?" she suggested.

"What? I thought your leg was numb," Ginny pointed out, raising her eyebrows.

"It's getting better – pretty sure I can walk on it 'till we reach the room," she replied, narrowing her eyes in a warning fashion.

"Well, let's go, then," Neville urged them. "We're already late."

"Alright," Ginny mumbled, sighing before she turned back to her best friend. "Come on, lean on me. We'll get there faster if I give you a hand."

Izzy huffed. "Fine," she mumbled, allowing her friend to support her as she walked. "I'm not… telling myself I don't like George," she whispered to Ginny as Neville led the way in front of them rather out of earshot. "It's just… it's scary, you know?"

"George? There's nothing scary about George – I'd be the first one to tell you to back off if he was some slime," Ginny assured her.

"I know that. But that's not what I'm talking about and you know it," Izzy replied.

"Do I?"

Izzy narrowed her eyes. "You just want me to say it."

"Say what exactly?" Ginny inquired, pretending to be completely clueless about it.

"You suck at playing dumb, you know? You're far too smart for it to work."

"And you suck at insulting people," the redhead replied. "Now, I believe I was nudging you towards saying something…"

Izzy huffed. "This is really not the time."

"Isn't it? I'm pretty sure being quiet while we walk won't make us go any faster. Besides, the coast is clear – Mulciber and Jugson aren't so smart that they'd make a double round just in case. So, go on. Speak up, _Isabelle_ – you know you want to," Ginny urged her, pressing just the right buttons so she'd break.

"Fine," Izzy mumbled. "I'm… we… it doesn't feel like just a crush anymore. It feels like… more. _That_'s scary. Happy?"

"Thrilled," Ginny replied. "About time you admitted out loud that you lo…"

"… _like _him!" Izzy interjected. "Like him."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "Semantics? Really? Alright, then. You _like _him. Now, what are you going to do about it?"

"Hey! You've just gotten me to admit it – baby steps, Ginny, baby steps."

"Wasting time, Izzy, wasting time," the redhead replied as they were just about to reach the door leading to the room of requirement. It was still closed, she noted, and Neville didn't seem all too happy about it."

"…come on, Seamus. You know I'm rubbish at remembering passwords," he was saying at the person behind the door.

"_No password, no entrance, Nev. We've discussed this. How do I know you're not some nutter on polijiuce_?"

"The door wouldn't materialize for me if I was some nutter on polijuice, would it?" Neville asked in frustration before turning to the two of them. "A little help here, please?"

Ginny let go of Izzy, who'd already fully recovered the feeling on her leg, and made her way towards the door. "The password is _Fawkes_, Seamus_. _Now open up. This is Ginny, by the way."

The Irish boy did as he was told, holding the door open for them just long enough so they could come in. "Was that so hard?" he asked.

"Quit being a git, will you?" the redhead replied as he closed the door behind Izzy. She quickly spotted over half a dozen people sitting on several chairs, pillows and sofas surrounding a large wireless device just a few feet away – one of the very few in the castle that hadn't been confiscated yet. "Has it started yet?"

Seamus shook his head as they approached everyone else. "It should've, though. You said it would start at five – it's twelve past five already. They're never this late."

"Are you sure your source was right?" Hannah Abbot asked as Neville very casually took a seat on the arm of her armchair. "Maybe the broadcast wasn't today, after all."

"Trust me, they had it right," Izzy assured her. Unless, of course, something had come up in the meanwhile.

"Who are those sources, anyway?" Lavender inquired, a bit sceptically. "Seems a bit weird you'd know all of this about Potterwatch, being stuck here like all of us and everything."

"We know a bloke who knows a bloke," Ginny replied simply as she occupied one of two chairs that had suddenly materialized into the room. And, of course, the sources being Sirius and the twins, they couldn't possibly find more accurate ones in what comes to Potterwatch, since they were the hosts of the program… "Just wait a little longer. It's a pirate station – it's not like they have much tech support if something doesn't go right."

"What took you so long to show up, anyway?" Parvati asked. "We were starting to wonder if we had to go looking for you."

"The Carrows were inspecting the dorms for smuggled stuff. We couldn't leave until they were gone – it'd have called too much attention," Neville explained. "They made a mess out of your trunk, by the way," he told Seamus.

"Bugger, I'd just packed up for the train ride tomorrow!" Seamus complained. "Did they find anything, anyway?"

"Nope. I managed to stick your skiving snack-boxes and invisibility hat to the outside of the window before they got there. Probably weren't counting on there being anyone in the tower since most of you take Transfiguration," Neville explained.

"We were lucky to have a free period too," Izzy provided. "We need to start thinking of moving our most dubious things to this room after Easter Break," she pointed out. "It won't open to the Carrows, Snape or the other two, so they should be safe here."

"Yes, that does seem like a pretty good idea," Susan Bones agreed.

"Shh, listen. It's starting," Padma Patil announced, turning the radio's volume up until Lee Jordan's voice filled the room.

"_… afternoon and welcome to another edition of Potterwatch. We apologize for the few minutes of lateness but, as it happens, our usual contributor, Rodent, messed up all the wiring on our equipment right before we were to start."_

"_It's Rapier! And I most certainly did not! You're the one who tripped on it_," Rapier – or rather one of the twins, though Izzy couldn't quite tell which one it was that time for sure, since they took turns at it and the interference on the wireless made it hard for her to notice the little giveaways that told Fred and George's voices apart. And, of course, George had refused to tell her the previous night when they'd written to each other which one of them was going to talk that time just so he could tease her about it later. "_Tell them, Rascal. Tell them I'm not the klutz here_."

"_I didn't see it happen – I just heard the bang and then found you both on the floor,_" Rascal – Sirius, in fact – pointed out, sounding quite amused.

"_He dragged me down!_"

"_Why do you lie, liar?_" Lee asked.

"_I am going to…_" The whole room snorted loudly upon hearing the sound of a microphone being knocked over.

As the squabble took place on the background, a deeper voice reached their ears, which Izzy recognized as Kingsley's. "_Whichever of them is the liar, I think it's fair to say someone fell down, wiring was misplaced and it held up the broadcast a few minutes_," he offered.

"_A someone that certainly wasn't me_," River assured the audience.

"_We'll just agree to disagree_," Rapier replied, although his tone seemed to have changed from the previous outraged one to a simply amused sort a little too fast, Izzy noted.

"Is it me or they switched places just now?" Izzy whispered to Ginny, who chuckled.

"Wouldn't put it past them. In any case, I bet an arm and a leg this is the one you were hoping to hear, if you know what I mean. The other's far too pig-headed to ever 'agree to disagree'," Ginny assured her.

Izzy had to bite her lower lip on order to keep herself from smiling.

"_Now, on to the news, Rapier, if you wouldn't mind starting_," Lee stated.

"_Do I ever?_" George replied. "_In the three weeks that have passed since our last broadcast. There seems to have been… remind me how many sightings of Harry Potter have allegedly taken place, River_," Rapier… or rather George, asked.

"_One hundred and thirty-four,_" Lee replied.

"_There is is. Thanks, mate_," he said. "_One hundred and thrty-four or, as I like to say it, a boatload of sightings – not just a boatload of them but also spread throughout the globe, some somewhere near the great wall of China, others among the penguins inhabiting the south pole," _he added._ "Now, my dear listeners, don't go thinking there's no explanation for this ridiculous number of sightings. In fact, I'd say one of two explanations would fit: first, Harry Potter must have around half a dozen twins we don't know about…_"

"_Seems perfectly plausible,_" Izzy heard her father stating._ "Who doesn't run into sets of septuplets three or four times a day? A plague, I'll tell you."_

"_I dunno,_" George agreed, trying to sound sceptical. "_Personally, I don't think I even know any set of twins. Do you, River?_"

Izzy and Ginny had to hold their breaths so they wouldn't burst into laughter over the tongue-in-cheek statement.

"_I do, actually_," Lee agreed. "_You're not missing much, you know? The wits and the intelligence being split between two… you see that they try, but, well…_"

"_Oh, they might just surprise you one day,_" George replied, the threat well hidden behind his tone for anyone who didn't know who was talking. "_But, back to the second reason for said boatload of Harry Potter sightings: people really need to get better past times than making up phony sightings of… I dunno, mythical creatures, famous people and… oh, yes, Harry Potter. I mean, really, we all daydream a little bit about the bloke these days, being the 'chosen one' and everything, but there's a little difference between reality and dreams. Personally, I doubt getting spotted holidaying in Antarctica is anywhere in Harry Potter's plans right now, not to mention it's probably a bit too cold for anyone's taste aside from the Abominable Snowman's_."

"_Aren't those blokes from the Himalayas?_"

"_Fair point, River, though not really the one I'm trying to make. Anyway, of one thing I'm sure, if our Death Eater pals had any reason to believe Harry Potter had fled the country, they'd be the first ones to shove it down our throats._"

"_I'm a bit inclined to just go with the septuplet version," _Sirius pointed out._ "It sure wouldn't hurt to have a handful of Harry Potters walking around."_

_"Yes, I do imagine that would make You-Know-Who seven times as annoyed," _Kingsley – codename Royal – tagged along.

"_Let's all cross our fingers, shall we_?" Lee suggested. "_Now, as you may have noticed our usual contributor Remulus is absent today, due to personal reasons, therefore Royal will be taking over the sharing of the least pleasant news, as well as his regular warnings feature. So, Royal, if you may_."

"_Thank you, River_," Kingsley said. The auror proceeded to start with the more unpleasant news, ranging from Hagrid's near-arrest a few weeks before, to a dozen more Muggle-borns having been shipped off to Azkaban the previous week (no children were among them, Kingsley thankfully assured them, which unfortunately didn't happen all that often. Soon enough though, a familiar, albeit expected name, showed up among the bad news… "_Charity Burbage, Sturgis Podmore and Luna Lovegood, remain among the missing people whose whereabouts there are no clues about. Those who do know where these individuals are, please send word to their families or friends_."

None of them said a word about it – enough had been said already. When they'd first noticed Luna hadn't come back, they'd hoped she'd just ran along with her father – if only she'd been so lucky… The news that Xeno Lovegood had been arrested quickly reached them, which left them wondering what had happened to Luna. Izzy and Ginny suspected she might have been somehow taken during the train ride home for Christmas – they'd all agreed to say their goodbyes over at King's Cross but she'd never showed up. Luna wasn't the sort of person who stood people up – she valued her friends far too much. None of them wanted to consider she might be gone for good, but three months had passed and there were still no news even though Potterwatch asked for them every single broadcast.

"_As for the deceased_," Kingsley continued, "_it is with great regret that we inform our listeners of the murders of Ted Tonks and Dirk Cresswell. We ask for a minute of silence on their honour and to pay our respects to their families_."

Not one dared not to comply to the auror's request – Izzy imagined all over the country listeners must be completely silent at the moment, honouring their fallen peers.

When the minute was over, her father took over with news from Hogwarts, saying nothing that would have really surprised any of them since they'd been there to witness every single barbarity he reported over the wireless. Kingsley tagged along soon enough, since there hadn't been many news from her father's corner that time, proceeding to share a few defence strategies and advice to help people protecting themselves – some were rather obvious although it didn't hurt to remind people of them. Others, however, were craftier and more out-of-the-box. Some of the Ravenclaws in the room were even taking notes.

"_Also, if you don't mind me adding something, Royal_," Sirius said at some point, when Kingsley seemed to be about done.

"_Not at all_," the other man conceded.

"_Since we're on the warnings corner,_" he said, "_Don't forget tonight is full moon. Now, while I'd like to point out that not all werewolves are unfriendly outside of their… let's call it 'time of the month' – personally, I know ladies who get far more 'unfriendly' due to a completely different 'time of the month' – let's not make it easy for Greyback to have his midnight snack tonight, shall we? Be sure to lock up your homes a little bit more carefully than usual and refrain from walking alone on the streets, especially if you live in rural areas. The pub crawl can wait for tomorrow, kids._"

"_Well, there go my plans for tonight, then,_" Lee provided with a chuckle.

"_By all means, River, do shower yourself with mead – I'm sure Greyback will appreciate the seasoning,_" Sirius replied.

That snorting that could be heard over the wireless certainly matched the one in the room. They were good at that, giving people things to laugh about despite the tragic nature of their broadcast. They needed that.

"_Alright, seasoning aside – and, just for the record, Mr. Greyback, I'd make a terrible meal, unless you're into skin and bones –, we've reached the end of another broadcast of Potterwatch. The password for the next one will be Evans_," Lee said. "S_tay safe._"

"_And don't forget to avoid the taboo word_," Kingsley added at the last moment.

"_Little hint – it rhymes with Voldywart_," George provided.

"_No, it doesn't_," Lee replied. "_It would need to end with 'mort' to rhyme._"

"_Who died and made you the Rhyme Queen, River?_"

"_Hey! That's Your Majesty to you, thank you very much!_"

And, once again, the catfight unravelled on the background as someone – that time Sirius – got a hold of the microphone. "_Well, I'll just go ahead and assume we all know what the taboo word is. Keep your ears open for the next broadcast and don't lose faith over there in the meanwhile. Support Harry Potter because he's certainly doing the same for you. And we're out."_

With that, the wireless went completely quiet. The room, however, became quite loud as everyone started discussing that day's broadcast with each other.

Izzy didn't miss the voices wondering about the identities of the mystery contributors. "_I swear I've heard at least one of those voices before. River, I think_," Hannah Abbot had told her and Ginny, leaving the two of them to make clearly wrong suggestions just to throw her off Lee's trail – his voice was bound to be well-known to some Hogwarts students, seeing as he'd been the Quidditch commenter for years.

With dinner-time approaching, though, the conversations quickly moved on to the logistics of scheduling their exits from the room, knowing that coming out all at once in a group would call far too much attention. As Neville slipped out along with the group containing Justin Finch-Flechtley, Parvati and Hannah Abbot (with whom he seemed to be quite entranced in a conversation), Ginny and Izzy ended up being the last ones to leave – sort of fitting, since they'd been the last ones to arrive.

They soon regretted it, though, as, while they were too busy chatting to even think of checking the Marauder's Map, they ran straight into Jugson and Mulciber on the seventh-floor corridor. They didn't look happy – at all…

"Ladies," the first one started, eyeing them with suspicion. They'd been marked, of course, ever since Snape had caught them in his office. Every time the two of them were seen on their own or alone with Neville, the Carrows (and now their two new pals) eyed them like they were just about to cause trouble – thankfully, they were always wrong, never really getting the much-needed dirt to get them into detention, "may I ask what you are doing here on your own?"

"Returning to our common room," Izzy replied easily.

"Returning from where?"

"From taking a walk," Ginny said, taking over when there was the need to lie, knowing she was the best one out of the two at it. "I believe that's still allowed before curfew."

Mulciber nodded. "It just seems odd – two pretty girls taking a walk on their own _indoors._"

The disgusting little creep, Izzy thought. The disgusting little _idiotic _creep. "Well, we could have gone out but we'd rather not spend Easter in bed with a cold or worse," she said, pointing at a nearby window currently being showered by copious amounts of rain.

"Right…" Jugson mumbled. "So you wouldn't know anything about an illegal broadcast."

Ginny raised her eyebrows at them with a poker face that only she could manage to make. "Broadcast?" she asked, her voice a mix of boredom and confusion. She was good. She was really good.

"On the wireless."

"I thought there were no wireless devices in the castle," Ginny replied, all but calling them stupid idiots with her eyes. "Didn't they confiscate them all in the beginning of the term?" she asked Izzy.

Izzy nodded. "Pretty sure they did."

"So you ladies wouldn't mind if we looked into your bags, would you?" Mulciber inquired.

Oh, he was so sure he was going to find one of those in their bags, Ginny could tell. That was the main reason why she was willing to let them search whatever they wanted in hers: so she could see their faces when they realized there wouldn't be detention handed to them that afternoon. Again. "Be my guests. In fact," she added, gesturing to the nearby window still before moving towards it, "allow me to empty mine for you."

They followed her there, watching as she turned her bag upside down and let a couple of books, some quills and a half a dozen rolls of parchment fall down. Izzy did the same with her bag, allowing the two Death Eaters to see – with quite a bit of disappointment – nothing seemed out of place. Not even the Marauder's Map, disguised under its cover shape of an old piece of folded parchment.

"Is that all?" Izzy asked.

"_What is going on in here?"_ they heard McGonagall saying as she appeared from behind Mulciber and Jugson.

"Just a spot-check, professor," Ginny told the older woman as she approached. "I believe all was in order…"

Jugson pursed his lips tightly. "It appears that way," he mumbled.

"Well, good," McGonagall said, crossing her arms. "One has to wonder, though, why two _groundskeepers _would need to call for any spot-check when their job is to take care of the grounds, not look after the students."

The two Death Eaters glared at the woman and she did the same – if someone asked Izzy, she'd say McGonagall's glare could wipe the floor with the other two's. "Times have changed, _Professor,_" Mulciber told her before the two of them were off.

"I suppose you think that's news to me," McGonagall mumbled under her breath before turning to the two students, who appeared to be sorting which things belonged to who in order to put them in the right bag. "Everything alright, ladies?"

"Yes, Professor," Izzy responded.

"They really were just fishing for a reason to give us detention," Ginny assured the older woman. "Which they didn't find."

"Yes – it was clear they were disappointed," the former deputy headmistress agreed. "Are you heading to your Common Room?" she asked, receiving a nod in return. "Good, then you can walk with me."

The two girls did so, following the older teacher through the hallways as she apparently headed to the Gryffindor Tower as well.

"You need to be careful around our new groundskeepers, ladies," McGonagall told them. "I don't think I need to tell them they're from the same stock as the Carrows."

"You don't, Professor," Izzy told her. "They were looking for something in specific, though. Wireless devices."

"Something about another illegal broadcast this afternoon," Ginny said, as if the details of it were unclear to her.

McGonagall wasn't fooled by it, though. The girls had heard every word of that broadcast just as she had, along with Flitwick, Mia and Sprout from a wireless device the latter had hid behind all the mandrakes (which the Carrows were terrified of, for some reason) in the greenhouses and then smuggled into her office inside the castle. "Yes, I heard something in passing," the woman said vaguely. "I imagine our headmaster won't be happy at all about it." Her lips curled slightly as she said so.

Izzy and Ginny did the same, stopping in front of the Fat Lady's portrait upon reaching their destination.

"Now, Miss Weasley, Miss Black, if you'd be so kind to place this on your Common Room's announcement board," McGonagall requested them, handing them a roll of parchment.

"What is it about?" Ginny inquired, taking the roll.

McGonagall sighed. "I'd advise you to see it for yourselves… otherwise you might not believe me."

The redhead did so, unrolling the parchment in front of her. "No way…" she mumbled.

"What?" Izzy asked, moving to another position so she could get a better view of the parchment.

"It's a seating chart for the Gryffindor coach on the Hogwarts Express. And it's on alphabetic order – that puts us on opposite ends of the train," she said.

"What? Let me see that!" Izzy said, snatching the roll of parchment away. It was true – there was a diagram and everything: she was in the first compartment on the left (as was Lavender Brown and Ginny was on the last one. Neville was lost somewhere in the middle too, in the compartment by Seamus's. "They won't let us pick our own seats now?"

McGonagall let out a long breath. "I'm afraid those are the new rules," the teacher said. "Believe me, we, the heads of the houses, have already stressed how ridiculous we think the arrangement is. To no avail, as you can imagine."

"It's a power-trip," Ginny said. "_Another_ one. And hear this," she told Izzy. "'Students are not allowed to leave their own compartments unless requested to do so by a teacher. Visits to the toilets are only allowed when accompanied by a teacher, one student at a time'," she read.

"It's ludicrous. At this rate I wonder what's going to be next term: maybe a freight train with individual cages for each of us," Izzy mumbled.

McGonagall pursed her lips. "I might have laughed at that idea before – now I'm not so sure if I should. I'm afraid we'll just have to wait and see." She gave them each a nod. "Dinner starts in ten minutes, girls – I'll see you down there."

"Thank you, professor," Ginny told the older woman as she started to walk away from them. When she was out of sight, she turned to Izzy and gave her an exasperated look. "So, is tomorrow gonna suck or what?"

Izzy huffed. "You have no bloody idea."

And neither did she…

* * *

"_Maybe you should've been a radio personality," _Sirius heard his wife suggesting over the two-way mirror as he lounged on the living-room sofa during their daily talk.

"You think?" he asked.

She nodded on the other side of the mirror. "_I've already told you that you're good in there. All of you in Potterwatch, really. You don't just inform people, which would pretty much be just breaking bad news to them. You entertain them – that's important, now more than ever._"

He grinned. "Well, I always love to hear a compliment, especially from such a pretty source. Now I'm sort of wishing it was tomorrow already."

"_And why would that be?"_

"Because if it was tomorrow, by this time I'd have my lovely wife right here, just at hand for me to kiss as thanks for the compliments she's sending my way," he replied.

"_But if it was tomorrow, the broadcast would've been a day ago, so I wouldn't be complimenting you for it since it'd be old news,_" she pointed out.

He chuckled. "Oh, I'm sure I'd find a way or two to get a compliment out of you," he stated.

He saw her smiling – he couldn't wait to see her smiling at him in person again. One day, he told himself. Just one day before she and Izzy got home for Easter Break. Then he could kiss her all he wanted.

"_Why am I not surprised you think so?_" she replied. "_Now, changing subjects before your ego grows further, where are my babies?_"

"Upstairs, splashing in their bath. Lulu banned me from the bathroom – said it was idiotic for me to even offer a hand when I know they'll get me wet from head to toe and Remus will be getting here any time now so we can head off to handle his monthly problem," he explained.

"_Well, she does have a point_," Mia stated. "_Has that menace you somehow convinced me in a moment of weakness to let you give our son for his birthday broken yet?_"

Sirius raised his eyebrows. "If by 'menace' you mean his spectacular new toy broom, then no, it's still perfectly fine. You should see the kid ridding it – he's going to be a star. He's been training some moves to show you."

"_Please tell me it's nothing dangerous_."

"How could it possibly be dangerous? The thing flies little more than three feet over the floor and I have the whole room, from floor to walls, covered with cushioning charms when he's playing with it," he assured her. "Trust me, it's perfectly fine – I wouldn't let him play with the broomstick if it wasn't."

Mia sighed. She knew it, of course. The one thing he never took risks on, was their kids' safety. "_And Mary? How's is her walking going?_"

"As is should. She gets up, she takes a few steps, she falls on her bum. Then she gets up again, takes some more steps and falls again. Honestly, I think she does find falling funny – it's probably the cushioning charms. Even Alex throws himself on the floor just for kicks sometimes – says it's like falling on a cloud," Sirius informed her.

She chuckled. "_I still can't help but feel a little bit suspicious that I just happened to be around for both her first word and her first steps, Sirius. Feels like a little bit of a long shot when I'm away most of the time, Sirius._"

"Hey, that's the version I'm sticking with," he stated firmly. She was right, of course, although she'd never catch him admitting that. He knew what it felt like knowing one had missed most of their child's milestones – he still felt bad for it sometimes when Izzy was around –, so he wasn't about to let Mia feel the same way.

For all intents and purposes, Mia had been there to watch both Mary's first steps and her first words. She'd been there, even if just for a few hours before she'd needed to catch the Hogwarts Express, for their little girl's first birthday on New Year's day and again for Alex's third about two months later (when Mary's walking feat had allegedly taken place). And, Merlin, was he thankful for Snape and the Carrows' antics that had led to that last one… Because he was pretty sure that if the Carrows hadn't immediately gone over Snape's head and refused to give Mia the weekend when Alex's birthday took place, right when she'd asked the headmaster over dinner in the Great Hall, he sure as hell wouldn't have taken his own turn at pissing the creepy siblings off by allowing her to have that day at Hogsmeade instead.

Sure, it hadn't been the same as having her home. Sure, he'd needed to take Lulu, Gabe, Molly, Arthur and Remus along to the Three Broomsticks just so he was confident enough the little ones were protected enough. And, sure, he'd spotted the ridiculous amount of spies standing around reading newspapers and downing drinks as if they were expecting them to be meeting to conspire. But she'd been there with them – that was all that mattered.

"_So, Tonks will really be staying over there tonight with Gabe, Lulu and the kids?_" Mia asked him, then, giving in to changing the subject.

Sirius nodded. "Yeah. With the baby coming any time now, it's not a very good idea for her to stay home alone. And when you add her dad to the mix…"

Mia sighed. "_How is she doing? Have you seen her at all since the funeral?_" she asked. Unfortunately, asking for a home leave to attend the funeral of a supposed traitor hadn't been much of an option then…

He shook his head. "She hasn't been going out much. I haven't seen much of Remus either – he's barely left her side at all. I guess he's afraid for the baby."

"_As he should,_" Mia stated. "_All this stress hitting when she's practically nine months pregnant… I'm surprised the baby didn't come early or anything. By now she must be overdue, already._"

"I suppose," Sirius mumbled. He wasn't very good at keeping track of the weeks on his own. "Merlin, I hope it doesn't come tonight. It would suck for Remus to miss it because it just happens to be full moon."

"_Well, it could happen. But then again, if it does, maybe he wouldn't miss it. Labour takes a while, especially for first babies_," Mia stated. "_Who knows, if it happened tonight, it might extend well into the morning_."

"Merlin, don't let her hear that," he said, gulping. Then again, Remus missing most of the labour might be for the best – pregnant Tonks could be unbelievably mean. She'd literally cursed Lee Jordan in the previous month when he'd asked her if she might be having twins… true, it had been an unfortunate question, that not even the twins had dared to ask despite her being so… huge. But if she'd cursed a nineteen-year-old for asking her such an idiotic question, who knew what she'd come up with for Remus during labour, as revenge for having knocked her up in the first place.

Before he could start thinking up said ways for Tonks to get revenge, though, he heard the house's doorbell. "Speaking of the devil, that must be them. I should probably go."

"_Alright_," Mia agreed. "_Send them my love. And be careful tonight_."

"I always am," he assured her. "Especially the day before I get to snog my lovely wife again."

She smiled. "_I'll see you at the platform tomorrow._"

"I'll be the one wearing the devoted husband face," he told her.

"_Love you_."

"Love you more," Sirius replied, right before his wife's face was replaced by his own on the two way mirror.

He promptly got up from the sofa, shoving the mirror into his pocket before heading out of the room. Having been allowed into the house by Kreacher, he quickly spotted Remus helping his wife the stairs with some difficulty, half because , due to the full moon, he looked a train wreck, half because Tonks didn't seemed all that willing to he helped.

"I do know how to climb up a flight of stairs, thank you very much," she was saying. There were dark circles under her eyes, indicating she'd been sleeping far too little and somehow her face looked less plump than it had been last time he'd seen her – that just didn't seem right for a woman in her state. "Just because I'm nine-months and a week pregnant, doesn't mean I've lost all my brain function all of a sudden. Worry about yourself – you look like crap."

"Thanks," her husband mumbled dryly.

"She's right, you know?" Sirius pointed out. "You look like the living dead."

Remus sighed. "It looks worse than it is."

"Liar," his wife accused him, a hint of worry on her face. "You could barely land out of the portkey. I shouldn't have let you take it with me – you should've stayed home and I'd send Sirius back for you."

"I wanted to make sure you and the baby got here okay."

The pregnant woman sighed tiredly. "We did. Now stop worrying about us. If you worried a little less about us and a little more about yourself, _this_ could have been avoided," she told him as she made her way into the living room, desperately needing to take a seat as pretty much every muscle on her body ached.

"What do you mean?" Sirius asked the auror.

"She doesn't…"

"The idiot forgot to take the Wolfsbane Potion yesterday," she said, interrupting her husband.

"What?"

"I took it today," Remus told him. "It will still work tonight."

"Yeah, but if you'd taken it yesterday, you wouldn't feel this shitty today," she said, sitting on one of the sofas.

"I'm fine, Dora," he told her.

"No, you're not. Look at you! You look pale as a ghost. You always look pale around this time of the month but never… never _this _pale," the woman said, her eyes starting to cloud with tears, courtesy of the hormone casserole raging over her body.

"Calm down, Tonks. I've seen him looking way worse before," Sirius told her. It wasn't a lie. Back when they were teenagers and Wolfsbane wasn't an option for Remus, he's be so ill sometimes that Sirius and James had to literally carry him into the Shrieking Shack under the invisibility cloak. "Maybe a little Pepper-Up potion will help – it did before."

"There's no nee…"

"_Kreacher_," Sirius called, ignoring his friend. The house-elf materialized right in front of them, holding a rag on one hand and a silver chandelier on the other, having been apparently interrupted while he was cleaning it. "Do we have any Pepper-Up potion?"

"Kreacher think so," he responded.

"Good. Can you fetch us some quickly?"

The house-elf nodded, vanishing the same way he appeared.

"You didn't need to bother," Remus said. "Honestly, we really should get going."

"We still have plenty of time before you grow fur, mate," Sirius told him. "No need for you to spend it looking so bad and making your wife lose her mind."

"She shouldn't be losing her mind," he replied before turning to her. "I really am fine."

"You really suck at lying, more like," she replied, before sinking against the back of the sofa and reaching for the latest edition of _Quidditch Digest _in order to use it as a fan. "Merlin, it's a million degrees in here."

It really wasn't but neither Sirius nor Remus brought it up. "So," Sirius started. "Not much longer, right?" he asked, nodding at her belly.

The auror smiled faintly and rubbed her stomach. "Tell me about it – this has to be the first Lupin who's late for anything. I feel like I'm going to give birth to a small elephant."

Sirius chuckled. "That would be uncomfortable."

"It already is," she assured him just as the sound of steps made its way into the room and Lulu stepped in with Mary on her hip as Alex followed them. Just as soon as the little girl spotted her godmother, a big smile covered her face and she pointed at her, uttering a word that could probably be spelled as 'Tonsh' or something of that sort. Clearly, it meant Tonks, which made the woman offer the little girl a genuinely open smile.

"Ah, didn't know you were here yet," the older woman said. She frowned over at Remus. "You don't look too well."

"That's being taken care of," Sirius assured his mother-in-law.

"If you say so…" She turned to Tonks. "How's the little one doing?"

"Great. Apparently, it's found a fluffy pillow on my bladder and it's probably using one of my kidneys as a teddy-bear too," Tonks replied exhaustedly. "I think it's safe to say the kid has made itself at home and shows no intention of leaving."

"Oh, don't worry about that. The human body has a way of evicting them before they get too comfy," Lulu assured her as she placed her granddaughter on the empty seat next to her godmother's. Mary didn't waste time before reaching over to Tonks, curiously touching her big belly with her little hands and soon enough pointing at it and accusing the presence of a 'bebe'. The metamorphagus welcomed her goddaughter's interaction with another smile, stroking the little girl's hair as she placed her head on the belly, trying to hear anything from inside.

Kreacher popped back into the room just then with a glass full of disgusting-looking liquid soon enough.

"Drink up," Tonks told her husband as Mary narrowed her eyes while trying to listen to the baby. "Don't make me go over there to pour it down your throat."

"Are you sick?" Alex asked his godfather, eyeing him suspiciously as he obeyed his wife by drinking the nasty-looking liquid.

"Not as much as everyone seems to think, Alex," he assured the boy when he was done.

Alex eyed him sceptically. "You should go to bed. Mama makes me go to bed when I'm feeling sicky."

Remus chuckled. "There's no need. The potion is already making me feel better," he said, mostly aiming the words of reassurance at his wife, who kept looking at him as she ran her fingers through their goddaughter's head.

"It looked yucky," Alex observed.

"I've had worse," he assured the boy. "Thank you, Kreacher," he added to the house-elf as he handed the glass back to him. "I think it's time we went, don't you, Sirius?"

The other man nodded. He could already see some colour back on his friend's face. "I suppose, if your better half allows it," he said, looking at Tonks.

The woman sighed. "I guess you don't look as bad now," she offered as he made his way over to her in order to place a soft 'goodbye' kiss on her lips. "Make sure you make it back in one piece in the morning. Or else we'll have words," she warned him.

His lips curled a little. "I'll do my best, darling," he assured her. "If the baby decides to come…"

"I'll let you know in the morning," she told him. "Don't keep your hopes up, though. This one clearly takes after me on the punctuality department."

Remus smiled a little on his way out of the room, especially when he heard his wife's laughter for the first time in weeks, when Alex asked her that, if the baby was a boy, she could trade it for Mary.

"Alright, give me a moment to go fetch my cloak from upstairs," Sirius declared once they reached the hall, heading up the stairs and leaving him alone with Lulu, who'd followed them out of the room.

"Thanks again for agreeing to keep an eye on her," Remus found fitting to tell the woman. "I couldn't stand leaving her on her own when she's so far along and Andromeda's just so… withdrawn. She can barely function these days."

"It's understandable," Lulu offered in an unusually empathetic tone. "She's just learned she lost her husband of more than two decades a few weeks ago. That's a horrible thing to feel." She could relate in a way – thinking for over a decade that Gabe was dead was just… disheartening. And back when he'd been 'dead', she could hardly say they'd ever had a… regular relationship. "Tonks looks well, though. A bit thinner and tired but in a better mood than I'd have foreseen."

Remus sighed. "She's got good days and bad days," he told her. "Sometimes she seems perfectly fine, others she just loses it and can't stop crying. The hormones aren't helping, I guess. She and Ted were quite close." The shock had been immense – Dora had cried for days, harder than he'd ever seen her cry, even back when his rejection was the reason for her tears. He'd feared for her and, Merlin, he'd also feared for the baby. The healers assured him the baby was alright but only Merlin knew how much he'd feared she might lose it so far into the pregnancy. "If she does end up cracking tonight…"

"… I'll know what to do. It's not my first time consoling heartbroken pregnant women," Lulu told him. "Mia," she quickly explained.

"Oh, right," Remus mumbled. "Sometimes it's hard to remember they spent all that time away from one other… and that Mia was pregnant when it first happened."

"She's in good hands," Lulu told him. "And if I can't manage on my own, I'm sure Gabe can cook up some sort of auror discussion to keep her busy until she goes under. Judging by her face, that shouldn't take too long."

The werewolf nodded just as his friend re-joined him.

"Alright. Let's get on our way, shall we?" Sirius said.

The two of them climbed down the stairs as Lulu made her way back into the living room to make sure the kids weren't overwhelming the pregnant woman or anything

"Off to the cottage, then?" Gabe asked when they reached the ground floor, at the same time he stepped out of the library, where he'd been previously reading.

"Better not cut it too close," Sirius replied. "The two-way mirror is on my bedside table if you need to contact Mia for anything."

Gabriel nodded. "I guess good luck is in order, then," he said.

"It certainly can't hurt," Sirius conceded as they reached the door. "Alright, guess we're off, then."

Just as soon as his hand touched the doorknob, though an intense feeling of burning surrounded his wrist. He hissed immediately, pulling it away from the knob. But still, the sensation remained unchanged – he already knew why. The burning had nothing to do with the doorknob – it was his watch. The watch that, along with Mia's, remained the only way Harry could safely contact them.

"Sirius, are you alright? What is it?" Remus asked.

"It's Harry," Sirius said. "He's in trouble."

**A/N: And so the path into the last phase of this fic (don't worry, there are still a few chapters and a sequel before you manage to get rid of me) starts. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	59. Sidelined

**A/N: And, as promised, an earlier chapter :D I would have made it earlier but all of a sudden I had a need to remind myself how much I hate painting walls...**

**Hope you like it! **

"It's Harry," Sirius said. "He's in trouble."

Remus didn't say a word at first – he just stared at him for several seconds. "How can you possibly tell?" he asked once his found his voice.

"My watch is burning," his friend replied, turning to look pointedly at his father-in-law.

Gabe's eyes immediately widened. He'd been the one to charm it, therefore he knew better than anyone what it meant. "He's calling for your help."

"Calling for his help?" Remus asked, confused. "But… how?"

"The watches are connected," Gabriel quickly explained. "Harry can use his to call Sirius's and Mia's for help. You need to use the spell and find out where he is," he told his son-in-law. "Quickly."

"I… but…" he turned to Remus. "Moony…"

Remus shook his head, knowing what was going to happen. "Go. Do what you have to do – I'll be fine on my own with the Wolfsbane."

"Will you? You may have some colour back but I doubt you're already in any shape to apparate yourself anywhere," Sirius replied.

As much as he wanted to deny it, Remus was fairly sure his friend had a point. He still felt quite weak at the moment and was pretty sure that apparition was a synonym to splinching at that point. He'd have to find an alternative way to get himself into his parents' old cottage, the safest place for him to transform.

"Do you think you can use the location spell on your own?" Gabe asked Sirius.

He nodded. "I think so."

"Then find a piece of parchment and do it before the signal fades away. In the meanwhile, I'll apparate him over to the cottage," his father-in-law said, nodding at Remus. "I'll be right back."

Well, that sounded like as good a plan as any, Sirius thought. "I'll meet you there if I get the chance," he promised his best friend, who shook his head.

"Don't worry about me – Harry's the one who needs you right now. Tell Dora I'll be fine on my own."

The two other men were out the door in a matter seconds and Sirius was off to floor above, looking for some parchment. He soon found himself bursting through the living room, opening drawers, desperately searching for some – where did parchment go when one _needed _it? Merlin knew he kept stumbling on it when he didn't.

"Sirius, what are you still doing here?" Lulu asked, eyeing him with confusion from the spot where she stood by the sofa.

"What's wrong?" Tonks added.

"Nothing," he lied, obviously. "Lulu, do you think you could take the kids downstairs and give them their dinner? Keep them occupied for a while too?"

His mother-in-law raised her eyebrows. "What's going on?"

"Daddy?"

Sirius stopped searching for a second in order to look behind, finding Alex standing there, looking at him with a stressed little look on his face. "Everything's fine, mate. Daddy's just playing a game," he lied to the little boy, forcing a smile. "Go on with Gran, will you?"

The little boy appeared to relax a little with the reassurance, though Lulu kept eyeing him inquisitively – she wouldn't fall so easily for the lie. "Well, Sirius?"

He huffed. "There's no time to explain. Ask Gabe when he gets back. Just please get them busy for a while," he requested. "_Please._"

The last 'please' seemed to be enough to get the woman to give in, as she was soon picking Mary up from the sofa and leading Alex out of the room by the hand. "Don't think you're off the hook, Black," she warned him before stepping out.

He nodded faintly, hardly caring at the moment, as he was then left alone in the room with the pregnant auror, who kept following him with her eyes as he jumped from drawer to drawer in search for a piece of parchment.

"Sirius, what the hell is going on?" she asked him, giving up on trying to deduce anything out of his actions – the guy was like a kid on crack… "Is it Remus alright? Where…?"

"Remus is fine, though it seems like he'll have to spend this full moon on his own. Gabe is helping him apparate to the cottage to make sure he doesn't splinch himself, so he's in good hands," Sirius said, breathing in relief as he finally found a blank piece of parchment under a pile of old magazines.

"What? But… what happened? You were going with him," she said, more as a statement than as an accusation. She really had no clue what was going on.

"Change of plans. Harry's in trouble," he said, moving over to the coffee table in front of the pregnant woman, where he placed the piece of parchment and his wand.

Tonks gave him a surprised look. "How do you know?"

Sirius shook his head, telling her to ask him later under his breath as he struggled to remove his watch, which, though no longer burning to the point of it being painful, still released plenty of heat.

From her seat, Tonks struggled to find a position that would allow her to see what he was doing – the baby's current position was certainly not helping making every move easier. When she finally managed to get a glimpse by propping her back further with an extra cushion, she saw him placing the watch by the piece of parchment's side before grabbing his wand. He soon pointed it at the watch and mumbled something under his breath – next thing she knew, he was lifting his hand and, as the wand stopped touching the watch, it was like a small golden string came up, one end being attached to the wand and the other to the watch.

He moved his hand very slowly – Gabe had warned him sudden movements could break the connection and destroy the message that identified the location. So, just in case, he didn't allow himself to as much as breathe until his wand finally reached the piece of parchment and the tip of the little piece of string that had been touching the watch previously moved to the black surface. He shook the wand for a second and let the string detach from it, falling fully onto the parchment – and then, he noted, it started to become darker, as if the parchment was absorbing it and turning it into ink. It soon started to look like a mere drawn line on the smooth surface, which slowly started to move around, shaping itself into words. When they were finally readable, though, he cursed heavily under his breath.

"What was that?" Tonks asked in disbelief. What the hell was that? How had the string become letters? And what did they say? They were written in print far too small for her to see without leaning closer, quite the hardship in her state.

"Harry's location," he mumbled, a thousand thoughts racing through his mind as he stared aimlessly at the paper.

"And…" the auror urged him.

He turned to her, a grave look on his face. "Malfoy Manor."

"Oh," she mumbled, remaining quiet for a second. "That's bad," she managed to say, stating the obvious.

"You think?" he asked, getting up in a flash and starting to pace left and right. He stopped all of a sudden after a few seconds. "I've got to get there! Yeah, I'm heading there. _Now_."

"What? Wait a minute," she said, giving him a surprised look. "You can't go in there just like that!"

"Watch me. I should send Kingsley a patronus…"

"Sirius…" the woman said in a warning tone.

"… have him warn the rest of the order for help… yeah, that's…"

"_Sirius, stop!_" she yelled. He turned to her in alarm, frowning deeply. "Will you stop and think for a bloody second?"

"I did think! Now I'm acting. The kid needs me in there – I'm going," he stated, determination all over his tone.

"Are you, really? And how do you expect to get in, genius? Let me guess: you're expecting them to be dumb enough to have left the front door open. Or maybe you can just ring the doorbell and they'll welcome you with open arms," she told him sarcastically. "The place is a bloody fortress, Sirius, and unfortunately the bad guys aren't always as dim-witted as we wish them to be."

"What are you saying, then? That I can't get in?" he inquired in disbelief. No, that couldn't be. That just couldn't be…

"Not if you head there with a hot head and a half-arsed plan!" she replied. "Merlin, you'd have made a terrible auror if you'd decided to be one."

"What do you suggest, then, Miss Five-Star auror?" he asked, out of patience. He didn't need lectures – he needed solutions. The clock was ticking, far too fast for him to like it

"Well, let me think, would you?" she said, taking a deep breath. "And stop pacing!" she shouted just as soon as he started again. "You're making the baby dizzy."

"Oh, for the love of…"

"Shh!" she said, clearing her mind so that she could do some thinking. She didn't know where to start. There were ways to break wards but she didn't really know any since they were all ridiculously dark and illegal. Then again, her not knowing them might not make much of a difference since, being dark and illegal themselves, the Malfoys' wards were bound to be proofed for all of those. Merlin, there was just no way around it, was it?

It was the damn bad thing about wards: they were great when they were protecting them and a pain in the arse when they were serving the bad guys. And the Malfoy's were just remarkably good – they'd tried to get into that house a good handful of times the previous summer, soon after they'd gotten reports Bellatrix might be hiding in there. Unfortunately, verifying hadn't been a possibility – by then, the Malfoys were official outlaws, therefore, barring the ministry from stepping foot into their property wouldn't make them lose much. They'd been so close to getting this Egyptian bloke who was famous from being able to crack pretty good sets of wards to help them but then the Ministry had gone and been taken over. If only they'd managed to reach any conclusion before… but not a single man they'd tried to send in had succeeded at it. If one was honest, they were basically slaves to their own magic. There'd come a day when…

And then it hit her like a brick wall. _Slaves_.

"Kreacher!" she said, startling Sirius and, soon enough, herself too, as the house-elf materialized in front of her even though she hadn't really been intending to call him, rather than just naming the answer.

"Kreacher?" Sirius asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Ms. Tonks call," the house-elf said, confused at their surprise. "Master tell Kreacher to come whenever Ms. Tonks call this morning."

"Good. _Good_," Tonks said, gladly. "Kreacher, I need to ask you something. You can break through wards, right?"

The house-elf eyed her with some suspicion. "Kreacher can if Master order Kreacher to," he responded.

Sirius looked at Kreacher, then at Tonks. "You don't mean…"

"Shh," she dismissed him, keeping her attention on Kreacher. "And humans… you can take humans with you, right?"

Kreacher hesitated. "Kreacher think so. Most times."

"Most times?" Sirius asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Not if wards are too strong, too dark…"

There was a general moment of silence. "But they usually aren't _that _strong, right?" Tonks said.

Kreacher shook his head. "No. Only happen to Kreacher at Hogwarts and… another time." He looked pointedly at Sirius, who realized which time he was referring to. The one when Regulus had died, in the cave where Voldemort had placed one of his Horcruxes…

Merlin, Sirius thought, those must've been some wards, made by You-Know-Who himself. Harry had mentioned they'd been connected to Inferi too. "Right," he mumbled. "But you could try to get in, right?"

The house-elf hesitated. He had absolutely no idea what was going on and breaking into the Malfoy manor with a human just didn't sound like such an idea Mistress Mia would approve… somehow he found her judgement far more reliable than his Master's. Still, he had no choice. "Kreacher must obey Master," he said.

"We're not asking you to obey, Kreacher," the pregnant woman said firmly. "We're asking you to help. Harry."

Kreacher's already huge eyes widened further. He didn't need to say a word for them to know he'd dive into the deepest pits of hell to help Harry. Or Izzy. Any of his young masters. "Young Master Harry in danger?" he asked, clearly alarmed.

Sirius nodded and was just about to explain further when Gabe burst into the room.

"Any news on his location?"

His son-in-law nodded and was just about to speak when Tonks interrupted him.

"Is Remus okay?" she had to ask before the conversation had a chance to be eclipsed by Harry's situation.

Gabe nodded. "He's fine. We got to the cottage safely. He's waiting for the transformation now," he assured her quickly before looking at Sirius. "You were about to say…"

"He's in Malfoy Manor," Sirius told him. "And Tonks thinks Kreacher's our only way in."

"House-elves are not bound by wards the same way we are," she explained quickly.

Gabe nodded. "Good thinking. But what about inside? The place is huge – I was there in a raid once a long time ago and finding anything in there was a pickle."

That, all of them thought, was a good question. Before any of them could suggest anything, though, Kreacher cleared his throat, capturing their attention.

"Kreacher know another house-elf… He use to work for Malfoys but Young Master free him. His name be…"

"…Dobby?" Sirius asked, interrupting him. "The little guy that helped Harry during the tri-wizard tournament?"

Kreacher nodded. "Dobby always want to help Young Master. He out of Hogwarts now – work at the Hog's Head. Kreacher can find him quick."

"Good. That's good," Gabe said. "Harry could be with his friends too – more than one house-elf could make a smoother escape."

"Great, then let's stop wasting time and go," Sirius said, approaching the house-elf.

"Go?" Tonks asked.

"Not you – you're not going anywhere in that state," he replied.

She frowned deeply. "Thanks for pointing that – because I'm a big idiot and don't realize that maybe getting into the Malfoy Manor while looking like a beached whale is a bad idea," the metamorphagus said sarcastically. "Obviously I'm not going anywhere but neither are you! Not in any state," she told him.

"What are you talking about? Harry's trapped in there!" Sirius protested.

"Kreacher and Dobby can get Young Master out," the old house-elf promised.

"But can you fight the Death Eaters probably hanging out in there on your own?" Sirius replied.

"What makes you think fighting is the best choice? Sometimes you need to be subtle. Mad-Eye always told me that the surprise element can make up a whole plan," Tonks told him.

"Well, Mad-Eye's gone now, Tonks!" Sirius told her, maybe a bit more harshly than necessary, he quickly realized when she glared at him. "And even when he wasn't, he knew there were also times when you need to get your wand and fight."

"Then let Kreacher and Dobby go in and find out if that's the case – if they need us there, they'll come back for us. But if they don't, great."

"Great? So what? We can just sit this one out?"

"No! So you can stay out of the way, genius!" Tonks replied.

"She's got a point, Sirius," Gabe told his son-in-law before he could protest further. "In auror training, they teach us there are two kinds of 'wanting to help': the kind when your help is needed and you'll be useful and the kind when it isn't and you'll get in the way. This is the second time: Harry needs a way out. Kreacher has it. Dobby has it. You and I don't have it. If we get in there, we'll be nearly as trapped as they are and the elves will have to rescue us too. We need to trust them with this one: that Dobby clearly knows how to get around the house and it's in his and Kreacher's nature to move quietly and swiftly. Plus, they can pop from place to place quickly. We'd just slow them down and that could get us all, as well as Harry and his friends, killed. We need to at least give them a chance to scope the place on their own – decide if they'll need us there or not."

Sirius pursed his and started pacing. His gut told him to go, his brain told him Tonks and Gabe were right and he shouldn't. Merlin, his mind was racing with the bloody dilemma… History was full of events that had taught him going by his gut usually didn't lead to any good: there had been the time when his gut had told him shoving a werewolf into Snape's face would be a pretty fun prank (in hindsight, he sort of wished that one had gotten bloody back then because it would have avoided a whole lot of trouble now…) and then there had been that other time when he'd decided to follow Lestrange's provocations by going after Wormtail without a plan – that had not only gotten him hurt but had also let him to hurt Mia more than he ever had the right to. But staying behind and waiting was just so… not him. He could foresee himself losing his mind with a lot of clarity.

"Sirius, we're wasting time," his father-in-law warned him. "You need to give him the orders or Kreacher won't be able to get in."

"Fine!" he shouted before turning to Kreacher. "Fine. Do it: get Dobby, go into the Malfoy Manor and get Harry out of there. If when you get there you see you need us, come back for us," he said, phrasing the orders very clearly.

Kreacher nodded, not once sending him the look of disgust he sometimes had on when Sirius gave him orders. And then, with a soft cracking sound, he was gone.

"You made the right decision," Gabe told Sirius as he started to pace again. "It's not always easy when it involves relying on someone else."

"Not always easy," he replied with a sarcastic chuckle. "Right. Try bloody excruciating."

He wasn't made for that – waiting. He was a doer. He _did _stuff, rather than waiting for someone else to do them for him. It was just in his nature. So staying behind and waiting… well, he wasn't quite sure how to even deal with it.

For starters, he went back to pacing – left and right, left and right… he had to stop, though, when he saw Tonks giving him the evil eye. He sat down on one of the armchairs… and then got up again as he couldn't bring himself to stay still. Merlin, it was driving him insane. And it had only been a minute or two since Kreacher had left, for Merlin's sake. He thought back to all these times he'd tried to talk Mia into staying behind during battles and realized how selfish he'd been – it was actually worse to stay behind! And, then, all of a sudden, another thought crossed his mind.

"Wait, what about Mia?" he asked, turning to his father-in-law. "Do you think she got the signal too? It was connected to her watch as well. Merlin, she must be losing it if she did."

Gabriel shook his head. "I honestly doubt it. I charmed the watch so the signal would be discreet enough so no one else would pick it up. For that to happen, I made it so it would've never reached both watches at the same time – it'd get to the closest one first and then if there wasn't a reaction from the owner, it'd move on to the other. Malfoy Manor is near Southampton, so the signal would've reached you first and since you checked his location, it never would've reached Mia."

"Good," Sirius said. "That's good."

"You'll need to tell her, though," Tonks pointed out. "She won't take it lightly if you don't. I sure wouldn't if it was this one…" she said, rubbing her belly.

"I will tell," he assured her. "I just… I need to have _something_ to tell her. Right now, I still don't. She doesn't need to be losing her mind the same way I am."

"Well, I'm afraid standing around in here won't help making it less stressing," Gabe stated. "I'm going downstairs to have a word with Lucy. Then I'll go check on the house's wards just in case. Call for me if anything happens."

Sirius responded with a nod, before moving over to the window, looking outside just for the sake of trying to keep his mind occupied. It didn't work, of course, so he moved on to other things, such as inspecting the drawers he'd been searching earlier, standing with his head against the wall, tapping his fingers on a tablet and eventually turning the telly on and taking to flipping through the channels. He couldn't help it – if he didn't do something, he couldn't stop thinking and that was bad.

Eventually, Tonks, who was pretty much stuck in the room with him, had enough. "Sirius, if you don't stop it right now – the pacing, the zapping, the fiddling with all sorts of stuff … – , I'm getting my wand and use it to turn you into a garden ornament," Tonks threatened. "And you really don't want me using my wand around you right now because this kid has completely messed up my magic – just the other day I was trying to open a Muggle soup can and it blew up instead!"

"I'm going mad here!" he replied.

"What the hell for? Kreacher would be back by now if there was some sort of vicious battle going on – he wouldn't be able to help it since you gave him orders to do it! Can't you wait quietly like a normal person instead of acting like a bored child?"

He pursed his lips but didn't respond. He knew he was being annoying, of course, though she didn't really have to point that out in such a moody way… Still, he did make a bit of an effort to stay in one place from then on, avoiding nervous ticks as much as he could. It worked for about five minutes, which would have been fine if that hadn't made those minutes feel like twenty instead.

"I'm sorry," he eventually heard Tonks saying before he turned to her. She did look a bit guilty… "I shouldn't have yelled… or called you a child. You've got every right to lose it a little bit. It's just… the hormones are driving me mad. It shouldn't be an excuse for everything but, well…

Sirius sighed. "It's fine," he told her. "You shouldn't have been dragged into all this, anyway. In your state, you ought to be using up your last days before the kid comes by and turns your brains into mush to relax, not to stress over mine."

She shook her head. "It's okay – I'm not very good at staying away from action, anyway. It's not in the auror nature," she told him before letting out a long breath. "I guess you never stop worrying, do you? About your kids… I've really set myself up for seventeen years of sleepless nights, haven't I?"

Sirius sighed. "Sorry to be the one breaking the news to you but those will probably last long after he becomes of age. Merlin knows that's the case with Harry… though hopefully Lupin Jr will have a much calmer life than his godfather's."

Tonks chuckled lightly. "I suppose you have a point," she offered, taking a breath. "They begged me to pick another career. My parents," she specified. "They didn't want me to be an auror because it was dangerous and stressing and… Merlin knows what more. But I did it anyway – it was what I wanted to be, so what else was I going to do? They made me floo in every day when I was in the academy… twice a day for the first month after I moved into field work."

Sirius nodded. He could see what she was trying to do: telling him her parents has been through the same… sort of; showing him she'd always been fine, regardless of their worry. If only it were so easy… He shook his head, telling himself to stop thinking of that. "I'm sorry about your dad, Tonks," he found himself saying instead, for the first time since the news of Ted Tonks's death has broken.

He knew those words should have come out of his mouth weeks before. It wasn't like he hadn't had the chance when they'd broken the news to her or over at the funeral… but she'd looked so fragile, back then. It had seemed like even bringing up the subject of her father's death might have broken her to pieces on its own. So he'd just stood there, always nearby with Remus, and patted her shoulder awkwardly. It wasn't like she cared, really – her mind hadn't really been around those first few days. It was now, though. Very clearly.

Tonks sighed, leaning her head against the back of the sofa. "He was a good dad. A really good dad," she said.

"Good," Sirius told her. "That's good – you deserved a good dad."

"So did you and you got a really crappy one, according to my mum," she replied.

He chuckled for a second. "Yeah. Nothing short of a psychopath, that one," he observed. "But forget about him – the old bastard is roasting in hell where he belongs. Hopefully I won't ever have to hear a word from him again, or at least not until I snuff it."

She rolled her eyes. "Please, if there's any justice in this world or the other, you won't be going to any sort of hell. You're nothing like that bloke and you know it. I mean, you may have your flaws, such as being cocky, reckless and having a habit of acting like a kid most of the time but despite all of that, you're a pretty good bloke. And, more than that, you're a great dad. Only a blind person wouldn't see you'd give an arm and a leg if that's what it took to keep those kids safe and happy. And they adore you – you're exactly the kind of father I'm hoping Remus will be for this baby," she mused, rubbing her belly.

Sirius managed to smile for a second. "He will, you know? Be a good father," he told her. "He's pretty much been one his whole life – I mean, if it wasn't for him watching over us, James and I would've been expelled from Hogwarts by fourth year."

Tonks rolled her eyes. "I think that's a bit different than raising a child, don't you think?" she stated.

"Well, yeah, but it means he's got the instinct, you know? To take care of people. Initial freak-out aside, he's been pretty good with you and the baby, hasn't he?"

She sighed. "It was a pretty big freak-out."

"It was a pretty big issue," Sirius replied. "I thought you were over it by now, anyway."

"I am," she said. "Well, most of the time. It's just… he left once, when he thought the baby might be like him. What assures me that he won't do it again if the baby does turn out to be that way? A werewolf?"

"Because he knows I'll break his face if he tried. And he knows how much he hurt you last time. And because he already loves that kid – you can see it every time he looks at you," Sirius told her. "Have a little faith in him."

She sighed. "I do. I always do," Tonks told him, rubbing her belly absently. "He suggested we call him Ted," she said. "The baby, I mean."

"I thought he didn't know it was a boy," Sirius replied.

"He doesn't," she confirmed. "He said that if it was a boy, we could call him Ted like my dad. And since I _know _it's a boy…"

"Ted, it is," Sirius supplied.

She nodded. "Teddy Lupin," she said, looking down at her stomach with a soft smile on her lips. "He'll be okay," she said, looking up at Sirius. "Harry, I mean. He's been through so much already – we both know he did the impossible by breaking into the ministry too. Getting stuck in Malfoy Manor somehow is nothing in comparison. You'll see Kreacher will have him here in no time. Maybe he'll even be around for Easter – Mia will love it if he is."

Sirius hadn't thought of that. If… no, _when _Kreacher brought Harry back, he'd be home. They'd have a chance to be with him, to be a family, even if just for a little while. Because there was no way he was letting the kid leave until Mia got a chance to see him too… not unless his life depended on it. "Maybe he'll be around to meet his godson."

"Hopefully," she replied, sighing as she eyed the gigantic bump. "I can't really take carrying him around all the time much longer. It's murder for your back – you blokes have it easy."

He didn't reply – he knew there was no way to answer that the way he wanted to and not getting kicked or punched somewhere sensitive. He really didn't feel like getting Tonks angry again – she was actually being quite handful in what came to passing the time… which reminded him to check his clock.

"Forty minutes?" he asked in disbelief. "Kreacher's been gone for forty minutes?"

"Thirty-seven, more like," she corrected him.

"It's too long," he said, getting up. "He was just supposed to get there, snatch the kid and his friends and come back. How long does it take?"

"A lot longer than it feels like when you're the one doing it," she assured him. "Trust me – the adrenaline makes time fly. Sometimes in the field you feel like something's taken a minute and, when you check, it's been like half an hour. Besides, being sneaky requires its time. You need to make sure the coast is clear, sometimes wait for people watching to leave, hide for a while… give them time. Forty's not bad. Once I had to hide inside this ridiculously narrow broom cupboard for like an hour for a mission – bloody uncomfortable and note that I was skinny back then."

He might've laughed at that any other day but he simply wasn't in the mood at the moment.

When he got up again to resume pacing, he clearly saw Tonks rolling her eyes at him. He didn't have a chance to start, though, as Lulu soon appeared on the doorway with a pyjama-clad Mary on her hip.

"Any news?" she asked.

Sirius shook his head. "Nothing. Alex?" he asked, noticing his son's absence.

"Gabe has him running around down in the library – the kid needs to exhaust his batteries a little more before we put him out of commission for the night," Lulu let him know. "As for this one," she said, nodding at Mary as she made her way to him, "she could use a bed-time story." And then, she promptly dumped the toddler in his arms.

"Lulu…" he started, shifting the little girl.

"Don't Lulu me," his mother-in-law replied. "Pacing around here won't help anything. You need to keep yourself busy or it will feel like millennia before that house-elf comes. Start by putting your daughter to bed – and don't complain about it. She's pretty calm this evening. Will probably nod off after a page or two. Mind you, I'm not usually this generous."

He sighed. She had a point, he noted as glanced at the little girl, resting her head on his shoulder sleepily. "Alright," he said. "But call for me the moment you hear something."

"I will, now _go_," she said, waving dismissively at the door.

Mary started protesting before he could make his way out, though, demanding a good night kiss from her godmother, who gladly conceded once Sirius brought the little girl over. Afterwards, Sirius noted as he left the room, the toddler went back to being unusually quiet. Could she really be that tired? Lulu had mentioned she'd been perfecting her walking skills all day, trying to chase Alex around. That was tiring even for him, he had to admit. She certainly didn't seem like she was coming down with something… Oh, well, he thought – at least that one was restful. That was the last thing he could possibly say for himself…

"I wish I could be carefree like that, you know?" he told the little girl as she sucked on her thumb. "Your brother's gotten himself in a huge pickle." He huffed. "I can't believe Kreacher's the one in charge of getting him out of it."

"Keesh," Mary said, looking around in search for the house-elf, having recognized the name from his father's words.

"Yep, Kreacher," he mumbled absently as he climbed up the stairs. "Guess if it all turns out okay, I'll owe him big." That actually made him groan – he hated owing stuff to people. And if that person – or creature – just happened to be the house-elf who'd followed every guideline his parents had set to make his childhood into a living hell, even worse… He shook his head – no, it didn't matter. If there was any good reason on that Earth to be on debt to Kreacher, it had to be saving his godson's life. "It will turn out okay," he told the baby, more as a way to convince himself than Mary, who probably didn't understand all that much of what he was saying. "If everything goes the way it's supposed to, tomorrow your mama and Izzy will be here and so will Harry."

"Ma," Mary mumbled before letting out a big yawn.

Sirius's lips turned up a little bit at the corners as he placed a kiss on the top of the little girl's head before stepping into the nursery, where he took a seat on the rocking chair with his daughter on his lap.

He reached for the book sitting on top of a nearby chest of drawers and opened it where he'd stopped reading the previous night. Lulu had been right on her prediction, as Mary fell asleep with odd ease against the crook of Sirius's arm three or five minutes after he started reading. He didn't stop there, though – even after he spotted the little girl snoozing on top of him, Sirius went on reading as the adventures of Babbitty Rabbitty turned out to provide a decent escape from the reality of Harry's life potentially being in danger at that very same moment.

He wasn't sure how long he read but he easily made it through _The Wizard and the Hopping Pot_ and The Fountain of Fair Fortune before he spotted Lulu standing in front of him.

Sirius eyed his mother-in-law for about ten seconds before doing anything – she didn't really gave anything away through her expression, so he wasn't sure of he should be relieved or mortified. He wasn't sure he even wanted to… Yet, he had to. "Are they…?"

"Fine, yeah. He's waiting down at the kitchen," the woman told him, snatching the sleeping Mary from his lap before he had chance to get up in a jump without minding the little girl. "If your break your neck on the way down, I'm leaving you there to rot," she warned him once he sped out of the door in a flash.

He mostly ignored his mother-in-law until, after skipping far more steps than it was advisable, he nearly fell on his face. He forced himself to get a hold of his own hurry – they were fine. Lulu had said so. She might be a lot of things but she certainly wasn't a liar…

His godson was fine, he repeated to himself in a mantra as he reached the ground floor. He'd done the right thing by going against his nature – thanks to Gabe and Tonks's urging – and picking the most obvious. And, just as soon as he took those last steps and entered the kitchen, he found himself once again face-to-face with… Kreacher.

He stopped on his tracks and looked around. Aside from Kreacher, only Tonks seemed to be in the room, eyeing him as her fork rested on a ridiculously large plate for fish and chips and pork pie, apparently. Later he'd ask himself how someone could possibly gobbledown such a mix but, at the moment, he was too busy wondering why on Earth his godson was nowhere to be seen.

Soon enough, instead of wondering, he was glaring at the house-elf wondering what the hell the little bastard had done. He should have known. He really should have known. "Where the bloody hell is my…?"

"He's not here, Sirius," Tonks told him. "He's fine, though."

"Then where…?"

"Young Master send this," the house-elf declared before he could finish the question, promptly handing a piece of parchment into to his master. "He ask for Master to read this before asking Kreacher questions."

Sirius didn't stop glaring at Kreacher, even as he snatched the piece of parchment away. He started to unfold the piece of parchment, noting immediately before he started reading that the handwriting was clearly Harry's.

_Dear Sirius,_ it started.

_I can't thank you enough for helping us – we wouldn't have made it out without you._

_We're mostly okay now – Hermione's not doing so well right now but we've been told she'll probably be alright. I suppose you can relax now._

_Kreacher wanted to take us home but I told him not to. I've already involved you enough by asking for your help and me being there would only put you in more danger. Please don't make him tell you where we are unless it's for a life or death reason – the lesser you know, the better for you and for us._

_Please send my love to aunt Mia, Izzy… and, well, everyone in our inner circle. Let them know I'm okay and that I'm doing my best to end this. And let Ginny know that I haven't fallen for some Veela yet. She'll know what it means. I'll try and write to her once I'm sure it's safe for both of us._

_Be careful – I'd like to have a family to come back to._

_Your godson,_

_Harry_

_P.S.: Thanks for Potterwatch too – listening to it is almost like being back home. _

_P.P.S.: Luna's safe – thought you guys might like to share that with the world._

Sirius sighed as he folded back the piece of parchment. "Bloody noble kid," he mumbled under his breath. "Couldn't he have ignored safety just for once?" He's been so set on having him over for Easter…

"Constant vigilance," Tonks quoted her late trainer as she ate a chip. "You know he's safe, though – that's more than you knew for the past few months."

She did have a point, Sirius thought before turning back to the house-elf. "What happened to Hermione anyway?" he asked Kreacher.

"Miss Bella," Kreacher mumbled, not offering much more as an explanation, since everyone knew Bellatrix was a clear synonym for 'torture'. "Dobby manage to get Granger girl out before it got to the worse, though. Kreacher think she going to be fine."

"So, everyone's okay, right?" Sirius said. "Everyone made it out okay. No permanent damage."

Kreacher didn't respond – that immediately set off some alarms.

"Kreacher?" Tonks asked, cautiously. "Is there something you're not telling us?"

The house-elf pursed his lips together, looking down.

"Oh, for the love of Merlin, Kreacher!" Sirius said, out of patience to handle his hesitations. "Just tell us what's wrong."

"Dobby," the older house-elf said. "He…"

Kreacher didn't finish – he really didn't need to.

"Oh," Tonks mumbled, getting the picture after a few seconds of silence. "Merlin… the poor little guy. How… was it… quick?"

The house-elf nodded silently, once again not offering more of an explanation.

"Okay," Sirius mumbled, taking a seat at the table. "Okay."

He couldn't help feeling pretty bad. And, strangely, not just because Dobby – the poor, dangerously helpful, house-elf – was gone. He actually felt bad at the thought that it could have so easily been old, slower Kreacher dying. Not that he'd terribly miss that one, Sirius forced himself to think. No, he told himself. It was for the kids because they just adored the blasted house-elf, who spoiled them shamelessly from time-to-time. And Mia too – she was rather fond of the little creep as well. So, him being gone would probably upset his family, which by extension would likely upset him. Because there was no way in hell he'd be upset over Kreacher being far, far out of his life. Maybe he'd missed the cooking. Probably the bickering too – with Snape having gone fully evil and out of range, who else would regularly fill the role of his opponent? But he wouldn't be sad, Sirius repeated in his mind. Just bored.

So, sure, he just felt bad for the danger he'd put Kreacher in for the sake of his family. They'd be the sad ones if Kreacher ate it. "Sit down," he ordered the house-elf, who mechanically obeyed his master. "Now, you're going to tell me about everything that happened."

Tonks cleared her throat by his side, making him look over at her.

"What?"

"Be careful what you order him to do," she warned him, waving her hand at the folded letter in front of her cousin.

He groaned before turning back to Kreacher. "Right," he mumbled, less than eagerly. "Feel free to leave out the parts giving away wherever you took Harry."

Kreacher nodded dutifully and was just about to speak when Sirius interrupted him again.

"And, just so I don't forget," Sirius added, trying to say it as matter-of-factly as possible. "Thank you. For… you know, saving Harry's arse."

"Young Master good for Kreacher," the house-elf stated, more or less making it clear he hadn't done it for Sirius, but actually for Harry. Like that wasn't obvious, anyway.

Sirius nodded. "Right… Good. Now, spill it."

* * *

"But are you _really _sure he's alright?" Mia questioned for the hundredth time since Sirius had broken the news to her through the two-way mirror.

"_Yes," _he replied. "_You know Kreacher can't lie to me. And pretty sure he wouldn't in this case either._"

"But couldn't he have come home at least?" she pointlessly asked, pacing left and right on the room with the two-way mirror in her hands. "He'd be safe there for a while – our wards are good."

Sirius sighed on the other side of the mirror. "_Love, as much as it pains to say this, I think the kid has a point on this one,"_ he admitted. "_The less we know, the better and the least chance we have to get him into trouble. I mean, imagine if Snape got it into his mind to question you under veritaserum – again – and asked exactly those questions that would make you have to tell him?"_

"I know, I know," she mumbled. "But this is just… frustrating." She sighed for a second before turning to glare at the mirror. "You should have told me about this earlier, Sirius. Merlin, how many times have I told you not to shelter me?"

"_I wasn't sheltering you, Mia,_" he replied. "_I was just waiting to have anything concrete to tell you. What would be the point of having both of us losing our minds when I wasn't even sure what was going on? All I knew was that Harry was in some sort of danger and happened to be in Malfoy Manor. Beyond that, all I had were suppositions_."

Mia regarded the mirror closely for a moment before taking a long breath. "I just don't want to spend my time wondering if while I'm stuck here at Hogwarts, the world isn't crumbling beyond those walls without me knowing it."

"_Love, if that ever happens, you'll know it once I see the first crack – just as soon as I'm sure the crack really is a crack, that is,_" he promised her. "_The last thing I want is for you to get blind-sided. You know it is._"

She sighed. "I know. I'm sorry. It's catching up with me, I guess – having to be here while everything happens out there. I wish I'd been there to help…"

"_You'll be here tomorrow_," he reminded her. "_And there wasn't much you could do here, anyway. Which brings me to the point that now more than ever I understand what it feels like to be watching from the side-lines. Bloody stressing – I think my life got shortened by a decade just because of it._"

Mia's lips curled a little. "I'll remind you of that next time you try to put me in that position during some battle."

"_After today, I won't really blame you_," he admitted, pausing for a second after saying that. "_He's alright, Mia."_

Mia nodded, despite of how much she wished she could see that for herself. "He's alright," she repeated her husband's words. "That's what matters."

"_It is,_" he agreed. "_Now get to bed – you've got a big day ahead of you tomorrow. It took Lulu nearly an hour to put Alex to bed since he was so excited by the prospect of seeing his mum._"

"I suppose it will take me far longer than that to get myself to sleep as well after hearing the news," she replied, knowing just how wired-up they'd gotten her. And it was too late then to get herself some dreamless sleep potion from the infirmary – it just wasn't worth risking crossing paths with a Dementor on her way there.

"_Well, that makes two of us,_" Sirius replied. "_I suppose I'll be joining Moony's monthly full-moon-themed rendezvous tonight after all. I'll bark him your regards._"

"You do that," she replied with a sigh. "Make sure Kreacher checks on Harry again in the morning, okay? Maybe he should take him some clothes and food and healing suppl…"

"_I'll make sure he takes Harry a full care package, Mum_," he promised before ordering her to take a rest again and bidding farewell until the following day.

Mia got up after she put the mirror away in the pocket of the cloak she'd set aside to wear the following day. She made her way to the window and looked out at the moon-lit grounds for a moment before resting her forehead against the glass and closing her eyes.

She knew Harry was alright – if there was one thing she was sure of, it was that Sirius would never sugar-coat anything related to Harry's safety just to have her crushed once she learned the truth. And Kreacher couldn't possibly lie to him. So, yes, Harry was okay. Still, that didn't change what had happened: there was not enough parchment in that castle to write down every single bad thing that might have happened to Harry at Malfoy Manor. It all ranged from horrible death to… even more horrible death, crossing torture and who knew what else. It was unsettling to know it, and even more unsettling to think it was far from over. Who knew how many more close-calls would come? How long before it all ended? How many more questions about that matter could she come up with before losing her mind?

She took a breath and told herself to stop there. It didn't work – not really. The questions still came every moment she lost her focus. But once she opened her eyes back up, something stole her focus altogether: the sight of three cloaked shapes making their way across the grounds under the moonlight. It didn't take her much imagination to gather that must be Snape and the Carrows.

They appeared to be headed to the gates, planning to leave the castle for whatever reason at half past ten in the night. Probably headed for some sort of emergency Death Eater meeting to deal with her godson's escape. She imagined their side wouldn't be happy at all with such a monumental failure…

She watched them slip out through the gates before closing the drapes with a quick move.

Harry was safe, she told herself. Harry was safe – everything was going to be alright. That one time, at least.

* * *

It was quite an unusual thing, Severus Snape considered. Being called by the Dark Lord so suddenly, into the Malfoy Manor of all places and with the Carrows in a tow of all people. His supposed master always wanted at least one of them in the school, making his presence known to all.

He heard the Dark Lords voice long before reaching the chamber they were in. It was angry – furious – and it wanted blood. More blood than it usually did. Bella's voice sounded next – it was a little frantic, a little desperate, and otherwise completely mad, as it always sounded.

"… _sure it was it, Master,"_ he heard Bella saying just before he reached the room. She was kneeling in front of him, penitent as if she'd failed him horribly and was now trying to make it right.

Snape put his mind walls up high – he knew failing to keep them that way for a single second could lead to months of carefully planned infiltration being ruined. A single thought would be enough to give him away.

"I recognized it immediately from seeing it walking around auntie Walburga's house when I was younger," Bellatrix continued. "It was her house-elf – it's obliged to serve Sirius now. He's got to be the one behind this."

"Sirius Black," the Dark Lord said. "Looks like he's not as out of contact with his godson as he says."

"He's a parasite, my lord," Bellatrix said. "Let me kill him – he'll have to come out of his hole sometime. Let me kill him for you, my lord."

"No," Snape heard his alleged master saying. "No, I think I have better plans for him. I'd say the Blacks have… overused the freedom we've granted them. It's clear they won't lead us to Potter, not even now that they've helped him run. It's time we turn the tables. Severus, Amycus, Alecto," the dark lord called for them even though he hadn't even acknowledged their arrival.

"My lord," Snape replied, kneeling down, a gesture mimicked by the Carrows.

"Rise," Voldemort urged the. Snape did so, carefully averting his eyes from him. "Potter and his little friends…" he said the word as it the notion of friendship itself disgusted him "… were caught today. Briefly, as you may have gathered. Snatchers brought him here under disguises and fake names after they broke the taboo word but these _fools_ I have for servants let them escape."

"It pains me to hear that, my lord," Snape replied, his eyes still down and he kept the barrier around his mind as strong as he could manage it.

"As it should," he hissed. "Black was behind the escape, it appears. I'd say he ought to be taught a lesson."

"I've been thinking the very same thing since I was unfortunate enough to meet him," Snape replied, in a rare moment of honesty. He even allowed himself to raise his head to see his master's face, then.

The Dark Lord seemed pleased. "Good. Now tell me, Severus: the girl… you have Black's precious little daughter over at Hogwarts, don't you? And his wife too. Isn't that right?"

"It is, my lord," Snape confirmed. All of a sudden, he felt cold. Very cold.

"And how easily could you make them both… disappear from the school? Discretely, of course."

"Very easily, my lord," Amycus replied before Snape could, sounding quite eager. "Tomorrow they'll be boarding the train to London for Easter. We could do it like we did it to the Lovegood girl."

"Good," Voldemort said. "Very good. So you could have them by tomorrow, I take it."

"Dead or alive, my lord," Alecto told him. "Whichever way you prefer."

"Alive," he told her. "I have quite some plans for them. A little cell in Azkaban. The same one Black occupied while he was in there. What do you say, Severus?"

"I'm sure he'll appreciate the poetics," Snape forced himself to say.

"I was hoping he would," Voldemort declared. "I'd like a word in person with them before sending them off. I expect to find them here tomorrow by this time, then."

He nodded. "As they will be," he assured his master before bowing and making his way out, reading the dismissal between the lines.

As he walked away, he listened to Bella going back to grovelling, offering her torturing services for either Mia or the girl. The Carrows ceased following him at some point, around the same time they ran into Lucius Malfoy down the hall – he imagined they'd be rubbing salt in the wounds inflicted by Potter's escape from his home.

The boy had nothing in his head, like his father before him. If only he'd gotten more of his mother in him, he might have gone without doing something so monumentally dumb like saying a well-known taboo word. At least he'd ran or all those months' work would have been for nothing…

And Black had gotten himself in the middle, of course – thrown his wife and daughter into the whole mess probably without even knowing. Cocky bastard probably thought he'd pulled it all off…

But, as much as he blamed it all on Black, he needed to do something, he knew. To stop it. To help them. Not for Black, certainly, as Merlin knew he simply couldn't stand the man even if that was required to save his own life. His wife, however, was another case.

One couldn't say he particularly liked Mia Black, even back when she was Mia Davis, but he certainly respected her. She'd been a good friend to Lily until death and the after it by raising the boy. As much as he found Potter distastingly… Potter-like, his godmother's gesture had been noble and more worthy of Lily's friendship than all his gestures together. And the girl… there was too much Black in her but he still couldn't abandon her. He'd made a promise to Dumbledore – to protect the students above all. She was his student and, had things turned out differently, he had no doubt she have been Lily's goddaughter. Lily would have loved her for it, so maybe there was still hope for her.

Besides, Azkaban was for criminals and deviants – Amelia and Isabelle Black were neither.

So, he knew what his mission was, then: he needed to find a way to warn them.

**A/N2: I am not a cliffhanger junkie (that's what they all say, isn't it?). I really am not. So, let me assure you that this one is_ really_ needed. You'll see why next chapter. No evil laughter here - swear on my newly painted (hopefully for very long) walls. Feedback is welcome (I can see an intervention in the horizon...). Review!**


	60. Saviour

**A/N: At last, the chapter made it into posting, more than a week later than I'd planned. Unfortunately, my father had emergency heart surgery a couple of weeks ago and my life turned into chaos between running to the hospital every few hours and juggling younger siblings. He's thankfully recovering well now and so is my inspiration. I cannot believe how long the chapter turned out - almost split it into two but then decided against it. ****So, I hope you like it. **

**30 March 1998**

Mia had slept for exactly one hour by the time she was woken up by a strange sensation of light hitting her on the face. She groaned. It couldn't be morning already, could it? Her head felt too heavy for it to be morning.

She tried to ignore it for about ten seconds before realizing that it would be just impossible for her to succeed. When she opened her eyes, her head still resting sideways on her pillow, she realized she was right: it wasn't sunlight hitting her on the face – sun didn't rise at four in the morning, as her alarm clock indicated it was at the moment, and it certainly didn't shine with such a silvery hue as the one illuminating the room.

Was she by any chance in the middle of a vivid dream or something? Mia vaguely thought as she shifted on the bed in order to sit up. As soon as she was done rubbing her eyes, she was sure she was. Because, standing in front of her, was a Patronus. And not just any Patronus. A doe-shaped Patronus.

"Lily?" she whispered, even though she knew it was impossible. It had to be. Lily had been dead for more than a decade and a half and Patronuses didn't just travel from the afterlife. But still it was so… familiar. Lily was the only person she knew to have that shape for a Patronus. So, who else could it be?

Mia got up slowly, pushing the covers away, and tried to approach the spectral animal. When she was a mere foot away from it, it spoke in a voice she couldn't recognize, as it was so clearly riddled with all sorts of voice-disguising charms. She couldn't even tell if it was a man or a woman speaking. But those were mere afterthoughts, of course, as the content of the message caught her full, undivided attention.

"_They're coming for you and your daughter as soon as you leave the castle. Take her and run once you get the chance."_

Later she'd ask herself how long she stood there, even after the Patronus faded, staring at where it used to be and taking in the words – the one thing she knew was that after they registered in her mind, there was panic. Pure, blood-chilling panic.

They were coming for them: for her, for Izzy. Merlin knew what for – nothing good for sure. And she needed to do something to stop it. But what? Go upstairs, take her daughter and run for the gates? That wouldn't work – the gates wouldn't open to her and she couldn't apparate from inside. There was just no way out and still Mia desperately needed there to be one – the 'how', however, was something she simply couldn't think of at the moment. Not while she was panicking.

She tried to calm herself down but seemed unsuccessful after minutes attempting to do so – it seemed she wasn't getting anywhere. So, in a short moment of clarity, she decided what she had to do – she needed to go to someone else.

First she hurried to get the two-way mirror – Sirius was and would always be, by default, her first choice of 'someone else'. Nevertheless, after a couple of attempts at contacting him and only getting reflections of darkness through the mirror, she recalled with unbelievable frustration he really wasn't an option that night – he helping Remus through the full-moon, which meant he must have left the mirror behind at home. While, under normal circumstances, she would have immediately branded that attempt unsuccessful and moved on, the panic made her waste precious time yelling at the mirror, as if it would miraculously make him materialize back home or get someone to help her even though there was no way the mirror could get loud enough to make anyone as much as stir in their sleep.

Though the yelling certainly hadn't led to the result she'd been illogically hoping for, it did allow her to release just enough tension to give her another moment of clarity – she needed to go to McGonagall. The older woman would know what to do or, if anything, would manage to talk her back into some sanity.

Grabbing her cloak from a hook by the door, she stormed out of her quarters into the freezing hallways. Even though she could see the puffs of her own breath on the air and knew days weren't even nearly cold enough to make that happen on their own, she didn't bother to connect that fact with Dementors hovering all over, looking to feed on unauthorized people out of their quarters. Thankfully, the Transfiguration master's quarters weren't that far away from Mia's, leading her to reach them quite quickly.

It took several seconds after Mia started to knock for the lock to click and the door to open, revealing a rather tired and confused-looking McGonagall on the other side. "Mia? What happened? Are you alright?" the woman said.

"For now. Something's happening today, Minerva," Mia told her. "They…"

"No," McGonagall interrupted her. "Come on in. It's safer to talk inside."

Mia did so as the older woman poked her head out of the room to check the corridor and then closed the door behind her. Once alone inside, she gestured for Mia to take a seat on one of the chairs in front of her desk, which she gladly did as she was practically dead on her feet.

"Tell me," she said.

Mia nodded. "I got a message a few minutes ago in my room. I don't know who it was from. It said… it said they were coming for us. Izzy and I. That they were taking us as soon as we left the castle, so we should run."

"I assume that by 'they' you mean Death Eaters," the older woman said.

"It didn't say but I thought as much," Mia told her.

McGonagall offered an agreeing nod. "Alright. Did it say anything else? Do you have the message on you? We might be able to find a trace of who sent it on the parch…"

Mia shook her head before she could finish. "It was a Patronus. I was sleeping and it woke me up… believe it or not, at first I thought it might be Lily. It was a doe – Lily's was always a doe, remember? But I know Lily's gone," she added once McGonagall started giving her an odd look. "I know it couldn't be her and I know what this sounds like – that I was dreaming or… imagining it. But I wasn't! I swear I wasn't – I was as awake as I am right now and I remember every word it. They're coming for me and Izzy – that's what it said. You have to believe me!"

"I do," McGonagall told her truthfully – and if part of her wasn't fully convinced, it at least believed Mia believed it. "I do, Mia. But you have to admit it sounds very… odd. And very rash, even for Death Eaters. Don't see this as me trying to disregard this… warning you received but Death Eaters are known for their twisted minds. This could easily be a sick game the Carrows, Snape or one of the other two decided to play with you."

"They've been here for a long time, Minerva – why would have it taken them so long to start playing this kind of game? Besides, the Patronus reflects the person's mind somehow – we've never seen any of theirs but I doubt they would have anything as tame and as graceful as a doe for a Patronus. They're sick, cold-blooded people – if anything, I would picture them as vultures or reptiles of some sort."

McGonagall nodded – she did have a point. "Alright. But we still need to think, Mia. Is there any reason why they would have decided to take you and Isabelle all of a sudden?"

"I don't know… because it's convenient, because we because Sirius and most of the Order won't be here when we head to the train, because they can, because…" Once realization hit her, she went quiet. _Of course_, she thought. It made every bit of sense. "Payback," she said out loud. "They want payback for what Sirius did."

"Sirius?" McGonagall asked in surprise. "What did he do?"

"He helped Harry," Mia said before taking a breath and making an effort to explain. "Harry was captured by Snatchers earlier tonight."

"What?!" the other woman said in alarm, shooting to her feet.

"He's okay now – Harry had a way to contact us in case of emergency, which he did. It told us he was in the Malfoy Manor, which, as you may imagine, is somewhere very warded – so warded that Sirius couldn't get in. So, he sent Kreacher instead. He did get Harry out and they tell me he's somewhere safe now. The thing is, Kreacher has been serving the Blacks for a very long time, even before Sirius was born…"

"And Narcissa Malfoy is a Black," McGonagall gathered, receiving a nod from Mia. "She could've recognized the elf."

"And, if she did, she would have known Sirius was behind it," Mia told her. "They have to be taking us as payback."

"And as bait," the other woman added. "Think of it – do you have any doubt Potter would come running for you and Isabelle if he thought there was a chance you might be taken?"

At that, Mia got up and started to pace around the room – she hadn't thought of that but it was true. Harry would come for them – no matter how much they'd told him not to, no matter how dangerous it was. That was exactly the kind of thing he'd do. "What do I do, Minerva? I have no way out of here now – not until I'm out of the gates and then it may be too late."

"Have you tried warning Sirius? So he could get the Order to help?" the woman asked.

Mia nodded. "I can't get through to him – it's full moon."

"He went to help Remus even after this whole matter with Harry?"

"He almost didn't go," she said, deep down – as fond as she was of Remus – wishing he hadn't, in retrospect. "But none of us really had much of a prospect of getting any sleep tonight, even after Kreacher sorted it o…" She paused for a second. "Wait, I could have Kreacher pass…"

"No, don't!" McGonagall said quickly, before she could finish forming the idea and unconsciously have him summoned.

Mia raised her eyebrows, confused. "Why not?"

The older woman sighed. "It may be nothing but personally, if my home was, so to speak, burgled, the first thing I'd do was to put stronger locks on the door, so to speak" the older woman told her, confusing Mia further. "Death Eaters were tricked by a house-elf tonight, Mia – if there's a time when they'd take precautions against them, it would be now. And while no wards can definitely keep a house-elf out of somewhere his master orders him to go to, there are very dark ways around that rule. They're rarely used since having house-elves is becoming an increasingly uncommon practice in Britain but they do exist. For instance, you should never, ever try to send an elf directly into a Gringotts vault."

"Why? What would happen if I did?"

"Well, nowadays you'd, first of all, be unable to utter the order, then you and the house-elf would be magically immobilized and you'd be arrested, regardless of being in a warded room or not. A few decades ago, though, I'm afraid you wouldn't live to tell the tale – it took a lot of pressure from the ministry and even Albus himself for the practice to change. It was quite problematic, especially when unknowing people tried to do it with their own vaults in order to skip lines at the bank and ended up dying horribly for it."

"Merlin," Mia mumbled. "You mean they can turn house-elves into a sort of taboo? Like the word?"

"When it comes to infiltrating certain places, yes, in a way. The point is that the few ways there are to stop house-elves can be potentially devastating – we shouldn't risk it so soon after Sirius has used the same method, even if it was somewhere else. I'll try and think of another way to get the message outside – in the meanwhile, I think it's best that you get Isabelle here. No one will check if students are in bed at this hour and I'm sure you'll be less anxious if you have her down here with you."

Mia nodded. "And the Dementors wandering around?"

"Well, Patronuses were created for something, weren't they?" she said, reaching for her wand and casting the spell in question, making a cat-shaped silvery form appear out of nowhere. "And besides, it's not as if Dementors can speak to tell Snape how much we upset we've made them with our late-night stroll," McGonagall argued.

With no need for more arguing, the two were soon on their way to the Gryffindor tower. Being upset led Mia to fail a couple of attempts at casting her own Patronus, as she couldn't seem to focus on a happy memory without her mind shifting to the threat hovering on her head every few seconds. She finally managed to get the silvery fog to turn into a dog once McGonagall prompted her to think of easier times by remarking how ironic it was that now they had to be the ones sneaking out in the middle of the night when she'd handed more punishments than she could remember to Sirius and his friends for that very same reason.

They walked with Mia's Patronus in front of them and McGonagall's behind – the system seemed to work, as the few distant shadows of Dementors they spotted on the way quickly vanished when faced with the Patronuses.

No one other than the Dementors seemed to be patrolling the aisles – the Carrows did it at night sometimes but Mia imagined that at that moment they must be having the best sleep of their lives, dreaming up about all the ways they could 'take care' of her and Izzy in the morning. The thought alone disgusted her.

"Happy thoughts, Mia. Happy thoughts," she suddenly heard McGonagall saying, as if she could read her mind. Except she didn't need to: in order know what sort of thoughts Mia was thinking she only needed to look at her Patronus, which threatening to fade away. "Think of good things," the woman simply said. "Think of all the time you'll spend in my office in a few years once that boy of yours makes it into the school and starts wreaking havoc like his father used to… well, still does, really."

As much as she was sure in the future (if there was one) she would find such a case anything but funny, Mia couldn't help feeling a wave of warmth at that. Because it _was_ a future. A normal future with her family. And it was certainly enough, even though it was not a memory, really, to get her Patronus to grow steady again.

They reached the tower a few minutes later and McGonagall chose to stay down in the Common Room waiting and watching out for anyone that might show up while Mia went up to her daughter's dorm in order to wake her up.

She didn't bother to turn the lights on inside the room, as she could remember every step inside it by heart – she'd lost count of the times she'd moved around it in the dark back when she was the student because Elizabeth would curse the existence of anyone who dared turning on the lights when she was sleeping. Moving with instinctive silence, even though Izzy and Ginny were the only girls in the room, Mia made her way closer to her daughter's bed – which, she vaguely noted, just happened to be the one that had belonged to Lily back in the day.

"Izzy," she whispered softly, trying to wake the girl as she stroke her hair. "Honey, woke up."

Izzy groaned in sleep and tried to ignore her by turning her back on her.

"Come on, love," Mia insisted. "You need to wake up. It's important."

She groaned again but, that time, she did turn back and open her eyes, which looked hazy and unfocused. "It's the middle of the night, Mum. What are you doing here?"

"We need to go," Mia told her. "Do you have all your things packed up for today?"

"Yes. But go where? And why? It's before dawn."

"Downstairs," she replied simply. "And I'll tell you why when we get there. Just trust me."

Either she meant to try to do so or not, Mia did notice her daughter shooting her best inquisitive look. "Is it Dad? Is he okay?"

"Your father is fine," Mia assured her. "Nobody is hurt right now – I just need you to come with me."

Izzy's eyes narrowed further. "Wait a second," she said. "What's Alex's favourite food?"

Mia raised her eyebrows for a second before realizing what her daughter was doing – she was checking to see if it was really her. Mia couldn't blame her, really – she must be sounding extremely odd. "Cookies," she responded.

"And what does Mary like to do the most during meal-times?"

"Throw food at your father."

"And what can't Lulu live without?"

Mia sighed. "Her beloved Muggle microwave."

At the third answer, Izzy seemed convinced enough that was her mother. "Alright."

"Wazz goinon?" came a slurring voice from the nearest bed. The two of them turned to find a sleepy Ginny eyeing them confusedly while sitting up on bed.

"I don't know. Mum says we have to go," Izzy responded as she got up.

"Go where?"

Mia didn't respond, immediately as she was too busy thinking. It was only in that moment that it occurred to her that, after them, Ginny would be the next great bait for the Death Eaters to use against Harry, even if they believed she wasn't dating him anymore. She was a Weasley and Harry was close to the Weasleys. He'd risk his life for them, as he already had numerous times before. And Mia knew that if anything were to happen to Ginny because she was too busy saving herself and her daughter, leaving the redhead behind, she'd never forgive herself. So, she knew what she had to do.

"Just downstairs," she told her daughter's best friend. "And you're coming too, Ginny. Do you have everything packed? We need to hurry – the closer we are to sunrise, the bigger odds we may run into someone on the way down."

"But what's going on?" Ginny asked as she climbed out of bed.

"I'll explain when we get there," Mia promised. "Now hurry up, girls."

They did and not ten minutes later, they were back in the Common Room, school trunks in a tow. McGonagall, who sat by the fireplace silently, got up and approached them immediately. She raised her eyebrows at Mia for a moment upon noticing Ginny's presence as well but decided against mentioning it out loud – Mia took that as acceptance from her part.

"Are all your things packed in there?" the older teacher asked the two girls, gesturing to their trunks. They nodded back in response. "Good. Now, ladies, if you'd allow me," she said, gesturing for them to take a step back from the trunks before reaching for her wand and, with a flick of her hand, turning the bulky luggage into the size of a wallet. The older woman then made another gesture with the wand, summoning both tiny trunks from the floor and handing them to the girls. "Far handier to carry this way, aren't they?" She then turned to Mia. "It wouldn't be a bad idea if you did the same once you head to the train. That way it won't have to leave your belongings behind if you have to dump them during the escape."

"Escape?!" Izzy asked, alarmed.

"We'll explain in a little while, honey," Mia promised, turning to McGonagall before her daughter could even try to insist. "Don't you think people will notice if they see us heading home without luggage?"

McGonagall looked thoughtful for a second. "You have a point. I suppose I can try and get you all a few unclaimed trunks from lost and found to serve as decoys. I imagine there are plenty – you wouldn't believe the amount of things students leave behind every school-year."

The way back down seemed far much easier and less stressful than the way up, Mia thought. She imagined it might related, at least in her part, to the relief of having her daughter on sight – and surely, the two extra patronuses that had joined the previous two did a much better job keeping Dementors away.

Once inside Mia's quarters – McGonagall barely had the chance to close the door –, the girls were quick to yet again demand an explanation, which, that time, they didn't deny them. It didn't take very long for Mia to explain the whole thing, being only interrupted for short interludes of Izzy or Ginny asking incessant questions about Harry's capture and subsequent rescue.

"But I just don't get one thing," Ginny mumbled once Mia was done. "If they're trying to get back to Sirius, why would they take _me_? Not to say that it's okay to take you instead or anything – it just doesn't seem to make much sense."

Mia had been dreading that question – she had, conveniently, allowed Ginny to believe her name had also been mentioned in the patronus message, mostly because she could picture the girl wanting to remain in Hogwarts unless she was opposed to a direct threat. Mia hated lying – or at the very least misleading – to her but, honestly, she would rather lie and make sure Ginny was safe than tell the truth and potentially have to leave her to fend for herself. Ginny was family: her daughter's best friend, her son's girlfriend. She'd be damned if it wasn't her job to look after her too.

Before she could offer the girl any answer, though, McGonagall jumped in. "Well, I'd say you'd make some excellent bait for Potter as well, wouldn't you agree, Miss Weasley?

"Bait? But everyone th…" Ginny paused for a second. "I mean, we've split up."

McGonagall eyes. "Miss Weasley, even if I try to pretend to believe that charade, there's a precedent that shows that even when you're not romantically connected, Potter would risk his life for you."

Ginny looked confused for a second before realization dawned on her. "You mean the chamber," she concluded. "But that was different – I was eleven then."

"He'd come running to save you even if you were a hundred," Izzy said, receiving a glare from her friend. "What? It's the truth! Or are we not talking about the same Harry Potter?"

"I'm afraid Miss Black is right," McGonagall said. "That boy would go around the world twice for a friend or family."

"Well, he won't have to this time," Mia said, putting on a brave face for the younger girls. "We know they're coming and we'll be ready for them."

"Is Dad helping? The Order?" Izzy asked.

"I haven't been able to get through to them yet – your father is with Remus now. He doesn't have the mirror on him. But we'll find another way," Mia assured her even though she felt a bit doubtful. Owls were too dangerous and would never reach them in time. The floo was cut. And a Patronus would never make it through the school's ward barrier.

Ginny and Izzy looked at each other, simultaneously thinking of the same thing.

"Actually," Izzy said. "I don't think you'll need to."

"What do you mean?" Mia asked.

"We may have a way to reach the Order – well, the twins, really. But they can sound the alarm bells for us," Ginny told them. "We'll just be passing on a message, though. We'll have to hope they find it in time, which they only will if they check… well, you could call it the 'recipient'. Getting through by the mirror would be much more effective."

Mia nodded. "I can try again in the morning but I'm not sure if I'll be able to reach Sirius."

"Well, it doesn't hurt to use their way as well, does it? It _is_ safe, isn't it, ladies?" McGonagall asked.

"About as safe as it is to write stuff down," Izzy remarked.

"Then I suppose that does it, doesn't it?" the older woman said. "How does it work?"

Ginny reached into her pocket for her reduced trunk and used her free hand to scratch her head. "Well, I suppose we should start by getting this back to a regular size."

* * *

It was a miserable, grey and sunless day – that was the first thing Mia noticed once she stepped out of the castle with McGonagall later in the day. It seemed appropriate, given the tension attached to the whole occasion, which seemed to grow by the second. As if breakfast in the Great Hall with a target on her and her daughter's head hadn't been tense enough, Mia thought – McGonagall had argued they couldn't miss it, though, as their absences were bound to be noticed by the Death Eaters in the Great Hall if they really were after them. They couldn't risk the Death Eaters knowing they'd been warned – subverting the surprise element of the potential capture was really their only trump at the moment since, aside from Izzy and Ginny's attempt at contacting the twins through the papyrus, they had been unable to get through to the Order to organize some sort of set up.

So, for that very same reason of keeping appearances, she'd been forced (with much protest) to keep her distance from Izzy and Ginny on their way to the school gates and instead join her fellow staff members a few yards ahead of the students, as she usually would. She made a point of looking back every few minutes, though, trying to spot her daughter and Ginny in the midst of the crowd.

"I'm sure it will all work out," McGonagall told her once they stopped near the gates, pretending to be taking care of their farewells, since Mia was set on not leaving until she was sure the girls were right behind her. "Just keep it simple like we planned."

Mia nodded, reciting the plan back to herself in her mind. She'd get the girls and apparate away as soon as the three of them stepped foot outside. Without flourish, without warning. They'd never see it coming. Clean and easy. Somewhat too easy… "Do you know when sometimes you feel like a plan appears too simple and easy to work?" she said.

The older woman shook her head. "Nonsense, Mia. You'll have luck on your side today."

She would, Mia knew. Quite literally, she thought as she slipped her hand into her pocket and felt the little vial her daughter had all but forced her to take. Where Izzy had gotten herself Felix Felicis was just beyond her but, as much as she had protested that Izzy and Ginny should split it among themselves, the girls had been firm that she'd share it too, to the point of promising they'd throw the third that was meant for her down the toilet if she didn't take it. She'd given in, eventually, and taken the little extra vial they'd poured her third into. They couldn't, however, take it until they were just about to step out: there was a very small amount of potion – it might last for half an hour at the most and every minute outside the gates would count.

"In any case," McGonagall continued as she reached into her pocket in order to get something out. "You might want to take this with you," she said, slipping the item in question into Mia's hand. "For afterwards."

When the younger woman peaked down into her hand, she found herself looking at what seemed to be some sort of parchment leaflet publicizing a pie-shop in Glasgow. She couldn't help shooting McGonagall a confused look.

"That has the same charm I used on that message I sent you over the Summer," McGonagall explained. "The real message is on the back – it won't show until Sirius touches it, just in case it gets intercepted."

"What is it?"

"Instructions. To cast the Fidelius Charm," the older woman explained. "I had Filius writing them down before breakfast."

"Minerva…"

"You know you need to do it," McGonagall told her. "The charm will make you the safest you can possibly be while on the run. Follow the instructions religiously. And choose a good secret-keeper – someone you could trust your children's lives with. Alright?"

Mia nodded. "Thank you. For everything."

"There's no need for…"

"_Professors_," an unwelcome voice said, making both of them turn to see Alecto Carrow approaching with her brother on a tow, as she pulled a terrified first-year Gryffindor behind her by the arm, in a rather awkward way.

"Professors," McGonagall replied in the same manner, making her disgust of them wearing such a title known by her tone. "How can we help you?"

"This one," Amycus said as his sister all but shoved the little girl further – she looked positively terrified with glassy eyes and a pale tone on her skin, "needs your assistance, McGonagall."

"It's _Professor _McGonagall to you," the older woman replied. "What seems to be the problem, Miss Fitch?"

"I… I can't find my friend. Sarah," the girl said, her voice trembling.

"Sarah Hooper?" Mia asked, receiving a nod in return. "What happened? Maybe she just went back to the tower in order to get something."

The girl shook her head. "I went looking for her there already. We were in the loo and then I came out to wait and then I… I don't know. She just wasn't there when I checked and I looked everywhere."

Something in the girl's narrative had both Mia and McGonagall immediately eyeing Alecto and Amycus with suspicion.

"What? Don't look at us – we're helping the girl," Amycus said almost mockingly.

"Yes, you have such golden hearts," the older woman said sarcastically.

The two of them just smiled in a rather disturbing way.

"Professor, please! We need to find her or she'll miss the train," the girl said, worriedly.

McGonagall pursed her lips. The girl was right to be anxious, of course, but something about that whole thing just stunk badly. Very, very badly. She turned to Mia for a second and saw the suspicion on her face as well.

"You should go handle this, Minerva," she said, nevertheless. Regardless of any suspicions she might have on the Carrows' intentions, a child's whereabouts were unknown – and if they _were _behind her vanishing, Merlin knew what they might have done to the poor girl. They just couldn't ignore it.

"Maybe both of us should," McGonagall suggested.

"So soon before the train's to leave?" Alecto said sceptically. "I hope you don't forget that teachers are no longer allowed the leave the castle unless they're to take the _train_ home. No exceptions. It'd be a pity if Professor Black were to miss it, though Easter in Hogwarts might be awfully interesting."

Mia pursed her lips – even though she was most certainly _not _planning on taking the train, she certainly needed to leave the grounds to get the girls and flee. She couldn't let them go outside on their own. She glanced over at the crowd of students out of instinct and, after a moment looking, quickly found Izzy standing with Ginny still quite a distance away from leaving the gates.

McGonagall seemed to realize as well that making Mia come along wasn't really an option – she supposed her only hope then would be to turn her plan around altogether. "I don't suppose you'd like to give a hand finding the girl, would you?" she asked the Carrows instead. At least if they were with her, they were away from Mia.

They looked at her like she was insane. "Wasn't bringing the brat to you enough? We're not babysitters," Amycus told her.

"And, she's in _your _house," Alecto remarked. "Therefore, _your_ problem."

It seemed there was no other choice – McGonagall had to help the girl, Mia had to stay behind and the Carrows didn't seem intent on leaving her alone. "I'm sure it'll be okay," Mia told her friend. "Finding the girl, I mean," she added to cover herself. "It's probably just a misunderstanding. Luck is set to be on our side for once, after all." She hoped the little mention of the Felix would soothe her colleague's mind – she just needed to find a moment to take it and then everything would be fine.

"Hopefully," McGonagall said, shooting Mia a look of apology. "Come along, Miss Fitch," she urged the girl before turning to walk away with her by her side.

As soon as she found herself alone with the Carrows, Mia didn't wait a second before starting thinking up an excuse to get away from them. "Well, I suppose this matter is handled. If you don't mind…?"

"What? Going anywhere?" Alecto asked in a mock-hurt tone.

"As, a matter of fact, yes. Like you've pointed out before, there's a train to catch and some of the students seem to be struggling with their luggage. Believe it or not, a teacher's services can extend beyond lecturing and intimidating."

"How thoughtful of you," Amycus said dryly. "But I'm afraid they'll have to manage on their own. We need a word before the train leaves."

"I have nothing to say to you," Mia told them bluntly, praying she could get away just long enough to drink the potion that would, hopefully, put the plan back on track. "Nothing you'd like to hear, at least."

Amycus let out a spiteful laugh. "_Well, _then you'll just have to _listen_," he stated firmly.

She could see they weren't going to leave her alone until they had what they wanted. She could only hope that what they wanted for the moment was just to annoy her. "Fine! Then say it now and be done with it," Mia said in an exasperated tone.

"We were actually hoping to take it outside," Alecto said. "Too many _students _here." She might as well have been referring to trolls, so much was the disgust she in her tone when she uttered the word 'students'. "It's a private matter, you see?"

So, there it was, Mia thought. Any doubt she had at the moment that the anonymous warning might be fake vanished at that moment – they wanted her outside and away from the crowd in order to take her. "Well, I wasn't born yesterday and we both know I don't trust you, so you'll have to understand why I'm not planning to go anywhere outside those gates with you," she told them boldly.

"Oh, but you are going," Amycus told her, his tone taking a nastier turn. "Because if you aren't, we are going to have Mulciber and Jugson get your precious little daughter and, well, let's just say you wouldn't like it if they did."

"Same applies if you cause a scene," Alecto added.

Mia felt as if they'd just sent a knife through her heart at the mention of her daughter – she knew Izzy was a target as well but, Merlin, did the direct threat make it all so much more petrifying… She pursed her lips together, unsure of what to say for a second. At that moment, she just wished she'd taken the damn potion already, regardless of how long it would last – that ought to have made her lucky enough to escape that situation. "What assures me that you won't do that anyway even if I join you?" she managed to ask after a while.

Amycus raised his eyebrows for a second before shrugging carelessly. "Fair enough. Let's up the stakes, then: there's a friend of ours who likes to play with her food. And the more interesting she finds it, the more she plays. I'd personally say she'd find a meal consisting of her blood-traitor cousin's little girl _very _interesting."

The knife twisted and dug deeper until she felt nearly out of breath. They didn't even need to utter the name for her to be sure they were talking of Bellatrix. And she knew they weren't lying about how excited that twisted woman would feel at having Izzy at her mercy. But still, she forced herself to remain firm, even though she could feel herself crumbling. "Once again, why should I believe you won't do so anyway?"

Alecto shrugged. "Bella may be a friend but her hit list is starting to put ours to shame. We'd rather not give her more fuel to burn if we don't have to."

"And, honestly, Black, even if you don't believe our motives, are you _that _willing to gamble your baby girl's future? Bad mummy, Black. Bad mummy."

She eyed the area where she'd last seen her daughter but at that point it was too crowded for her to discern anyone in the middle. She couldn't take it anymore – they were right. She wasn't willing to gamble Izzy's future. She knew her daughter had some Felix too but she knew better than to trust it blindly when the consequences of it not leading to the expected results could be so horrible. She had to go with the Carrows and she had to hope that Izzy and Ginny would find a way to run without her or, hopefully, with the Order's help if the twins had read the message the girls had left for them on the papyrus. If they didn't manage to run, she had to at least hope she wouldn't be the person responsible for Izzy being handed to Bellatrix Lestrange on a silver platter.

"You two disgust me," she said, knowing she was defeated.

Amycus chuckled. "Honestly, Black, we take that as a compliment from people like you."

"But tnough, flattery now," Alecto declared. "Do we need to do this the hard way?" she asked Mia.

Mia didn't answer. She just started walking to the gates, turning her back on them – she didn't need to look back to know they were following her. And, once she reached the student-filled area by the gates, the Carrows were no longer just following her – Alecto effectively moved to walk by her side, grabbing her arm in a rather abrupt way as if she expected her to try and disappear in the middle of the crowd, which, now that Mia thought of it, might have been a decent idea. Maybe then she would have managed to get the Felix without them seeing and drink it.

"_Mum?!_" she heard Izzy's alarmed voice calling all of a sudden. She turned to the direction her voice had come from and spotted Izzy by Ginny's side on the line leading up to the gates, looking at her being walked out of the school by the Carrows with absolute horror on her face.

"I'm just heading out to help Professors Carrow with something, honey," she lied for the sake of appearance, which, to her own relief, she saw Izzy didn't buy. And, since the girl seemed to be in a rather perceptive mood, she tried to pass another message along. "Don't bother waiting for me to come back to head your way, okay?"

"_But…_"

"I'll see you later, love," she said, hoping that would be the case and, if it indeed was, that it would under positive circumstances.

She didn't have a choice other than walking away towards the gates since Alecto was making her impatience known by grasping her arm so tightly, she might just be cutting off her circulation. Before she was able to step foot outside, though, Alecto yanked her arm back, making her stop.

"What?" Mia shouted in a frustrated tone. "I thought you wanted me out."

"We do," Amycus confirmed. "But you'll have to hand over the wand first."

Mia eyed them both with wide eyes – it seemed they were past the point of hiding their real plans.

"What? Did you think we'd just let you walk out with your wand so you could apparate away on us?" Alecto inquired with a snort.

"I would _never_ run and leave my daughter behind," she hissed.

"Regardless," the other woman said, leaving her hand open in front of her so she could deposit the wand on it. "You don't want to be difficult, Black. You really don't. Or else, well, you can apply our earlier threat to this new situation. Hand it over and get on with it."

With her lips pursed in an attempt to fight back an urge to punch the woman right on the face, Mia did what she was told. For Izzy's sake, she told herself. Just for that.

"Don't worry, Black," Alecto said with a snicker as Amycus barked at a number of students to make way so they could step out through the gates. "You'll have the wand back once we let you go."

"Don't insult me," Mia told the woman, eyeing her with disgust. "We both know you're not letting me go back."

Alecto raised her eyebrows. "Well, you're not as stupid as we pegged you," she simply observed in response.

And, just like that, there was her absolute confirmation. Not that she'd had many doubts at that point, anyway, Mia had to admit. Discretely, when they were already out of school grounds, she brushed her hand against the outside of her pocket in order to feel the little vial of potion inside and make sure it was still there – she didn't dare try to get her hand inside to get it. Amycus was walking behind her at the moment and Merlin knew he might spot the move and catch her in the act. "You don't need to take her too," she couldn't help saying. "Izzy, I mean. Whatever it is you're trying to accomplish, I'm sure you'll achieve it if you take _just_ me. She hasn't done anything. She's just…"

"Listen to that, Amycus. _Pleading_. So pathetic," Alecto mocked as they made her walk to the woods surrounding the path that led to Hogsmeade station.

Amycus chuckled from behind them, soon rushing to walk by Alecto's side. "Pathetic and useless," he added. "Put one thing in your head, Black. When we're given orders by our master, we get it done. Period."

"And do you?" Mia asked, hoping one last time the warning was somewhat wrong. "Have the orders to take her, I mean?"

The man's lips curled. "I guess you'll just have to wait and see."

Mia's heart sunk – he might as well have said 'yes'. And, at that moment, Mia knew that her daughter's safety depended on her alone: McGonagall was nowhere in sight, the Order showed no signs of making it in time and, the farther they walked away from the Death Eater-covered path, the least hope she had that a good Samaritan might show up. At that point, her only chance of escaping the Carrows before them deciding they were par enough to apparate her wherever they wanted to take her was the Felix – she needed all the luck she could get if she had any hope of overpowering them without a wand and make it back to the gates in order to run with the girls. So, very slowly in order not call any attention to her movements by her part, she started trying to reach inside her pocket.

"Am I at least allowed to ask where you're taking me?" she asked, for the sake of keeping them distracted as she tried to do her thing.

"You can ask all you want – doesn't mean we'll tell you," Amycus told her. "For now you could just say we're 'keeping it discreet'," he said with disgust.

"Snape's idea," Alecto added, as if she was defending their reputation from being somehow tainted by the notion that they would ever worry about discretion. "He seems to think we need to do this quietly to avoid uprising."

"Bloody coward, that's what he is," Amycus said. "Those little brats should see it all – that way they'd know what was waiting for them if they don't submit to the Dark Lord. They'll have it all coming."

"Like that little girl you made disappear before? Sarah? Did she have it coming?" Mia asked, eyeing them with accusation at the same time she managed to use two fingers to slowly fish the vial out of her pocket and hold it inside her closed fist. She nearly dropped it, though, when Alecto burst into unexpected laughter.

"Please, the brat?" she asked. "She's not even missing! She wasn't going home in the first place – it was her friend we messed with. Little Miss Fitch, isn't it? It's amazing how easily those kids get… confused – just a wave of a wand and she was running for McGonagall."

Mia narrowed her eyes. It took much more than a simple Confundus charm to get anyone's mind to spin such an elaborate tale about a friend going missing – she had no doubt in her mind the Imperius Curse had to be involved. "I thought Snape didn't allow Unforgivables to be used on students," she said. "Not even by you."

Alecto rolled her eyes. "Don't think we don't know he only does that to annoy us. The Dark Lord only lets him get away with it because he offed Dumbledore. But who's going to tell Snape now? You?"

"Minerva will realize that girl is cursed sooner or later," Mia said, formulating the plan to drink the Felix in her mind: get the cap off the vial, fake a cough and drink the liquid once she turned her face away from them.

"Even if she does, what will Snape do? Fire us?" Amycus pointed out.

Mia didn't respond, making them snort once she looked away in disgust – they seemed to be reeling on her decency. That didn't bother, her, though, as it distracted them enough from paying attention to what she was doing for her to start putting the plan into practice.

Just as soon as it began, though, it crashed and burned: keeping her arm down by her side, she used her thumb to pry the glass cap out of the vial… however, instead of falling silently on the grassy ground under her feet, it just happened to fall onto a rock, bursting instantly into pieces. And, just like that, two wands were pointed at her face.

"What was that?!" Amycus shouted as his sister kneelt to examine the broken pieces of glass.

"What _is _that?" Alecto asked once, upon looking up just a little, she found Mia grasping the little uncapped vial in her hand. Before Mia could even try to hide it, the Death Eater used her wand to paralyze her arm, forcing her rigid hand to open so she could get the vial. "Look," she told her brother as she approached him. "It's some sort of potion."

"A potion?" Amycus asked, eyeing the vial with suspicion before turning to Mia and glaring, still pointing his wand at her. "What is this for?" he hissed.

Mia didn't respond him. There was no way she was going to let him know he was currently holding luck in his hand – Merlin knew what horrid things might happen if it turned out to be a lucky day for one of the Carrows.

"Answer him!" Alecto yelled.

She still didn't.

"So that's how you want to play it, Black?" Amycus asked, an odd glint suddenly showing up on his eyes, as if he was actually… excited. Mia knew that couldn't be good but she still didn't give in. "Alright – then don't come saying that we didn't give you a chance." The hold on his wand became firmer and a sadistic little smile covered his face. All of a sudden, before he started to say the word, Mia already knew what it was going to be. "Cru…"

Before he could finish uttering the curse, Amycus was tumbling forward, unconscious after a burst of red seemed to hit him on the back.

Alecto reacted immediately, motioning to turn to where the spell had come from, intent on attacking – before she could even spot her opponent, though, another flash of red knocked her out cold, causing her to fall down on the floor, dropping the little uncapped vial of Felix Felicis.

Relieved, Mia didn't even care that the precious potion was currently wasting down on the ground. "Thank Merlin," she said, motioning to turn. "I thought you guys would never co…"

She went speechless all of a sudden when she found herself facing her saviour, standing at a distance behind where the Carrows had been. She'd been expecting Sirius, Kingsley, Gabe or anyone else from the Order. She really had. And yet it was none of them, she thought with disbelief – it was about the last person she would have expected to be saved by those days.

"Snape?" she whispered.

The headmaster didn't respond. He simply walked closer to the Carrows' unconscious bodies, reaching down in order to retrieve their wands, as well as the one sticking out of Alecto's pocket. "I believe this belongs to you," he told her, handing the last wand back to her.

She took it silently, still staring at him. "What…?"

"They're already here, by the way," he stated, his voice with its usual bland tone. "The Order – I believe you were expecting them. They're headed this way as we speak. Not fast enough, though."

She didn't understand it. Any of it. Why was he talking to her like that? Why had he just saved her? Why? "It was you, wasn't it?" she asked suddenly, as something clicked in her mind. "It was you who sent the warning."

He didn't say anything immediately, instead putting the Carrow's wands away inside his robes, pledging to later burn them to a crisp, mostly for the sake of witnessing their humiliation over losing their wands to what they'd believe would be an unarmed woman (after he was done messing with their memory, that was).

"But why would…?" She didn't finish the question, though, as, upon recalling the way said message reached her, it all unravelled. "The doe. Your patronus is a doe."

"Yes."

"Like Lily's," she added.

"Yes again," he repeated.

"But then…" She paused again, unsure of how to process it all. "Merlin, Severus, all this time and now… what are you _doing_? Why are you with _them_?!"

"Would I be helping you if I were _with them_, Amelia?" he replied.

"So you're with us, then?"

"I'm with _her," _he stated firmly. "But I'm afraid this discussion won't be leading anywhere."

"Not leading anywhere? This changes everything, Severus!"

Snape sighed. "It doesn't. Because you won't be remembering any of this."

"Wha…"

She never saw the stunner coming since he cast it wordlessly, just as the cushioning charm he used before she could hit the ground.

He wished it could have gone another way, potentially ending that exhausting string of deception he'd had to put up – Merlin knew he could use a rest – but the plan he'd carefully crafted with Dumbledore was far from over. And for it to flow as it should, he had to keep his true allegiance hidden, which meant making sure Amelia Black wouldn't recall that particular event.

He was careful placing the memory charm, making sure it didn't erase more than a few hours. He knew he didn't have much time to clean up after himself, though. Upon seeing the Order arrive, well secluded as he kept an eye on things, he'd left a few clues behind to make sure they would have found their way to the Carrows, which, he hoped, they must be following at that moment. He'd hoped not to have to intervene himself but matters had gotten far too complicated for him to leave them to chance.

So, quickly, as he started hearing voices at a distance – voices he certainly didn't recognize from his Death Eater acquaintances – he moved closer to Alecto and Amycus's unconscious bodies, forcing himself to touch each of them so he could bring them along once he apparated away from there – as much as, personally, he wouldn't have lost any sleep over leaving them to die or be captured, explaining how such a thing had happened to the Dark Lord would be a bother. He supposed he had to stick with their disgrace for the moment.

He didn't go too far, though, wanting to make sure those idiots at the Order did what they were supposed to. Apparating to the specific spot behind some bushes he'd been hiding in before, Snape watched the whole scene unfold. Shacklebolt was the first to show up, followed by Amelia's father, McKinnon, and, later, her mother. He was surprised for a moment that Black wasn't with them but then recalled his daughter was in risk too – he must be helping her instead.

Voices were inaudible there as, unlike the Carrows, the Order seemed to know the importance of being quiet. A point in their favour. Still, Snape could imagine they might be wondering about what had led to Amelia Black being alone, unharmed and unconscious in the middle of the woods.

They didn't waste too much time wondering, though, as McKinnon soon lifted his daughter off the floor and apparated away with Amelia's mother. Shacklebolt stayed, though, likely to oversee the rest of the operations.

Snape didn't pay much attention to it, though, as he needed to set things up so his little covert work wouldn't lead to exposure

He quickly placed the Carrows back where he'd knocked them out after making sure they wouldn't remember a fourth person attacking them – he was sure someone would eventually stumble upon them though, deep down, he wished that wouldn't happen for a while so they could rot, as they deserve. And, with that thought in his mind, he was off to the gates.

His part was almost done, he told himself. For the moment, at least. All he needed to do then was keeping an eye on things… provided the Order didn't screw it up saving the girl, that was.

And then that bloody day would be over. Just yet another one in a long line of exhausting ones.

* * *

"They took her. They just… took her."

Ginny sighed upon hearing her best friend saying the same thing for what had to be the hundredth time since they'd seen Mia walking off with the Carrows.

The two of them still stood on the line by the gates, waiting for their turn to leave the castle – every time it moved, Ginny actually had to push her friend forwards because she seemed to be too lost on staring at general area behind the iron fence surrounding the school where they'd last spotted Mia before she'd disappeared into the woods.

Ginny didn't like it – she didn't like it at all. Not just that Mia had been taken, likely for more than a chat, but also that her friend seemed so… absorbed by it. Of course, she had a right to be horrified by her mother's potential kidnapping but, Merlin, Ginny could just see her going and doing something incredibly… rash. Something Ginny had no doubt she'd join one way or another. And, really, with all the Death Eaters looming outside, they were both doomed because of it… unless some liquid-aid interfered on their behalf, at least.

"Hey, whatever dumb thing you're planning to do, save it for after the Felix, okay?" Ginny whispered to her friend, unceremoniously reaching into the pocket of Izzy's cloak and shoving the little bottle into her hands. "And do it quickly because it's almost our turn to go out."

Izzy eyed her, then the bottle, slightly confused at first. The confusion lasted a mere second, though, as she soon uncapped the bottle and took a gulp – a single gulp, she reminded herself, in order to leave Ginny her share. When she handed it back to Ginny, there was still half of the liquid inside, which the redhead drunk without hesitation, putting the bottle away in her own pocket.

The feeling didn't come immediately – that voice instructed them on what to do. That one would take a few more minutes to make itself heard. Ginny could only hope it would howl loud enough at Izzy so that she'd have no choice but to listen to it.

"You're planning to go after her, aren't you?" she asked her friend.

"Wouldn't you if it was your mother?" she replied.

Ginny sighed. What use was there lying about that one? "Yes. If I knew I was the only one who could help her, I would."

Izzy was silent for a moment. "They mustn't have read the message," she mumbled.

The redhead didn't need her to specify to know she meant the twins and the message the two of them had sent through the papyrus. "It was always a long shot they would. Not everyone is as obsessive checking the papyrus as you are."

Izzy didn't respond to that. "It's up to us, then."

Ginny nodded. "One thing, though: in case you haven't noticed, there are a bunch of Death Eaters outside. And, personally, I'd say you'll need all the luck you can get to get through all of them."

"I've already taken the potion."

"It's not just about taking it," Ginny replied. "You need to _listen _to it. Being overconfident enough _not _to listen to it can lead to pretty disastrous results. Look, the potion is supposed to make you lucky and, at the end of the day, if you lose your mother because of it, you've been anything _but _lucky. Just keep that in mind, okay?" she said, just as the two of them found themselves facing Filch, who seemed to be coordinating the students' exit from the castle.

"Names?" he mumbled monotonously, as if he'd never seen them before in his life.

The girls didn't bother pointing out that he already knew their names, just giving them to him, hoping that would get them off the grounds faster.

There was another large group of students outside, as no one seemed to be allowed to take the horseless carriages until everyone was out, for some reason. Izzy and Ginny didn't mind – as far as they were concerned, the more confusion in place, the more easily they could disappear without people noticing.

"Is it telling you anything yet?" Ginny asked her friend, referring to the Felix's inner voice.

Izzy shook her head. "We can't waste much more time," she said.

"Just give it another…" she stopped talking all of a sudden as, while examining their surroundings, she suddenly found herself facing something rather curious at a distance, half-covered by some bushes. Her lips curled just a little as she pulled her friend's sleeve. "Take a look at what's behind those bushes on my left. By the trees."

Izzy gave her a puzzled look before complying. Her eyes turned to the area Ginny had indicated but, at first, she didn't see anything particularly exciting. It was just some bushes with a dog in… She paused. It was some bushes with a _dog_ in them. A big black dog that might just be taken as 'The Grim'. Only it wasn't 'The Grim'. "It's my dad," she whispered to her friend.

"I guess they _did _get the message," Ginny said, her lips curling. "And I doubt it's only your dad they brought along."

"The whole order, do you think?"

"Some of it, at least," Ginny said.

Izzy turned back to her father's animagus form, who was still watching her from the bushes. If he was there with the Order, they needed to help her mother. Did they even know she'd been taken? She had absolutely no idea. So, just to try and signal him, she nodded sideways towards the area where she'd last seen her mother being taken, hoping her father would get that she meant for him to check something out in that direction. In response, the dog just nodded, not moving an inch.

"What is that supposed to mean?" she mumbled.

"What?" Ginny asked.

"I just gestured to where they took my mum so Dad would go help her," she said. "But he just nodded."

"Maybe he already knows," her friend pointed out.

"Then why isn't he helping her?!" Izzy whispered furiously.

"Because they have it under control?" Ginny suggested. "That might be what he's trying to tell you."

"Or maybe he's saying I should go after her," Izzy replied.

Ginny looked at her like she was mad. "I'm sorry – I was under the impression we were talking about your Dad, who tried to get you to stay home because he thought coming to Hogwarts alone would be too dangerous for you. Do you actually think he'd signal you to run through a mob of Death Eaters to try and save your mother while he sits around in dog form?"

Now that Ginny said it, Izzy's suggestion ceased making sense in her own head. "Okay, then maybe it's not it. But why isn't he helping Mum?"

"I don't know. They must have a plan or something," Ginny told her. "Like I said, Fred and George wouldn't have sent him here alone. At the very least, they would've come along themselves. They could've split tasks or something."

"Fine, but if we don't know the plan, how are we supposed to know what they want us to do?" Izzy asked, rubbing her temples as she felt an odd echo in her mind. Was it the Felix? She didn't recall it feeling so… distant last time. Then again, she'd taken a different dosage then.

Ginny looked thoughtful for a moment. "I'm not sure. I guess ultimately, they want us out of here. Do you feel it now, though? The Felix?"

"I dunno. Maybe," she said, concentrating on the echo. "What do you feel?"

"Just a whisper. It's getting clearer, though."

Izzy felt it too. The whisper, growing louder and louder but less and less echo-y. "It's telling me to get ready. Get ready to…"

"To run," Ginny whispered. "But not yet. And I'm not sure where."

"Exactly," Izzy replied. "So, what now? We just… wait for something? Ready, set, go?"

Ginny shrugged. "I guess. What else can we do?"

So, they did. They waited… and waited. Longer than they'd expected – certainly longer than a minute. And how frustrating was it, Izzy thought, waiting for something that they didn't know what was? It was like she was frozen on a moment that would never pass.

Her father remained where she'd first spotted him – immobile. The crowd that had been surrounding them, though, was starting to vanish as the students being carted off to the train, carriage by carriage. She had a feeling the Death Eaters would have saved them for last – her and Ginny, that was. They'd have wanted them away from everyone to take them.

_Go now! _The voice told her all of a sudden, much clearer than before, just as the sound of an exploding charm hitting a tree at a distance reached her ears – some sort of distraction set up by the Order, she'd later realize.

She wasn't sure where she was going at first – she wasn't really thinking as she ran, just following instinct, which, in turn, followed the Felix's guidance. It was only several seconds later, when she looked sideways and then back, that she found herself running alone. Ginny was nowhere to be seen. The voice in her mind told her not to waste time worrying, though. Part of her knew that, just like her Felix-voice had taken her that direction, Ginny's must have taken her another – in theory, the Felix would always take them through the path with the best results. In _theory_.

And, not long after, stopping where she stood, Izzy realized she'd gone exactly the opposite way her mother had been taken. _Keep going. She doesn't need you,_ the voice told her, but she remained frozen. Part of her wanted to go back – needed to go back. It was her _mother_. Felix or no Felix, she needed to help her. She needed to… _Run. Run now!_ The voice all but screamed in her mind. But she still she resisted. She resisted until the very moment the voice desperately spoke again. _Move or you're done!_

And, that time, something in the tone made her comply. So, she moved, though not forward – just a step to her right… and narrowly missed some sort of purple spell that exploded once it hit a tree.

The voice wasn't kidding, she thought as she resumed running. They were following her – the Death Eaters, no doubt. And, just like that, she lost all hope of going back. _Go back and it's over. And not in a good way_, the voice told her. That time, she listened. She believed it.

Soon, the voice told her to run faster – she did and quickly heard shouting behind her as more spells started to fly her way, some escaping her by mere millimetres. She didn't dare looking back from then on – she just ran, following the voice in her head.

Her heart pumped, her legs hurt, her skin felt cold even though she knew she must be sweating. At some point, she lost track of how long or how far she'd ran – she just hoped the Felix wouldn't fade before she was… well, as close to safe as she could get. Honestly, she had no idea where it was taking her – it just told her to keep going straight ahead.

When the Felix gave her an order other than '_keep going on a straight line_', right around the time she found herself reaching a hillside, it already hurt to breathe. _A step to the left and then straight ahead,_ it said. She followed the order, imagining that would lead to a gentler path down the hillside… and instead found herself tripping on a rock and rolling down it.

She just kept rolling and rolling, unable to brace herself due to the blinding pain caused by having fallen straight on her left arm. It got worse with every turn down the hill, right up until she hit the bottom, nearly out of breath. Merlin, it felt like someone had tried to rip it apart, she allowed herself to think for a moment before Felix, mixed with a boatload of adrenaline reminded her that she needed to get back on her feet or she was doomed.

She'd only managed to get on her knees to try and push herself up when she saw a shadow on the floor from someone over herself. Before she could react, though, she felt herself screaming as two hands grabbed her by the shoulders. No, that couldn't be it, she thought. It couldn't just end like that after all that running, all that… effort. The Felix couldn't just let her down like that: she wanted to go home, she wanted her mother to be okay, she wanted… she wanted everything to be normal. So, she fought back as hard as she could and, Merlin, did it hurt. Her arm felt like it weighed a thousand pounds and like it was falling apart with every move she threw her assailant's way.

At some point, her vision got blurry and she felt herself nearly falling down. Oddly enough, the assailant supported her so she wouldn't – only then did she hear the voice above her own screaming, which seemed to have ceased them. She recognized it immediately.

"…calm down. It's me, Isabelle. It's me."

Yes, it was him. "George," she mumbled incoherently before managing to turn and see him looking down at her with more than a little concern. He was there. He'd come for her. Thank Merlin.

"It's me," he repeated. "Are you okay? I saw you falling… Did you get hurt? Stupid question – of course you did. Where…?"

"I… my arm," she mumbled.

His eyes shifted to it for a second but then he had to look away as they heard the Death Eaters' footsteps and voices coming their way. He wrapped one arm around her and pulled her impossibly close. "Hold on, Isabelle," he whispered to her. "Don't let go."

She nodded faintly, closing her eyes and resting her head against his chest, hearing the sounds of the Death Eaters approaching. It felt like a nightmare – a bad one. Except in nightmares she never really felt pain while, at the moment, her arm hurt like nothing else before…

And then it just got worse – she felt the strange, awfully uncomfortable pull of apparition. Merlin, it was usually bad but going through it with an injured arm just made it worse. She didn't dare opening her eyes as she was nauseous enough on her own and simply pulled herself closer against George, who held her back silently.

She felt her feet hitting solid ground seconds later but still didn't allow herself to open her eyes.

"It's okay," George whispered against the top of her head. "You're safe."

She opened her eyes and saw he was telling the truth. They were all of a sudden standing in the Burrow's familiar, yet unusually empty, kitchen.

Taking a breath of relief, she suddenly felt incredibly awkward over standing so close to George and took a step back at the same time he walked over to a window in order to open up the closed drapes.

"We should take a look at that arm," she heard George telling her softly as he made his way back to her.

Izzy didn't reply. She just looked around awkwardly, not sure of what to do or what to say. Not because of where she was or really who she was with – because of where she'd been. Or what she'd been in the middle of. Five minutes ago, she'd been running for her life – now she was in the Burrow for the first time in months, her legs heavy from all the running and her left arm sending waves of pain through her whole upper body as she cradled it. "They took her, didn't they?" she asked all of a sudden.

"Who?"

"My Mum."

He didn't reply immediatly. "Maybe not."

"They had her. I saw it. I… I should have ignored the feeling," she said, regret all over her voice. "I should have gone after her."

"No, you shouldn't," he told her. "We were already after her. Kingsley, Gabe, Lulu… They wouldn't have let her be taken."

"Then why aren't they back yet?!"

"Maybe they _are_ back and we just don't know it," he replied. "We had to plan everything really fast. I guess we were so focused on how to get you all out of harm's way that we failed to set up a general meeting place for after we did. This was the first safe place I could think of – Merlin knows there's a ton of other places they could have gone to instead. I'm sure they're all fine, Is…"

"How can you possibly be?" she asked, her tone bordering on anger. "We were running, there were Death Eaters everywhere, the Carrows had my mother… it was chaos! They can be hurt, they can have been taken…"

"They can be just fine," he said firmly. "Look, we can't think they're not okay. Not by default. None of us out there was exactly inexperienced when it comes to defending ourselves, your Mum included. We had a plan, we had the surprise element and we had the skills to put up one hell of a fight."

"You were outnumbered," she replied.

"Not by much," he told her. "Really – we managed to gather a few people from the Order after I got your message and warned your Dad. By the time your mother came out, we were already splitting into groups and spreading out around the path and, like I told you, there were plenty of people heading to the area they took her to. It wasn't that bad, really."

She wanted so badly to be as certain as he was. She felt like part of her was dying with every second that passed without news. "Are you sure?" she asked faintly.

Well, no, he wasn't _that _sure he thought. They'd been really about a dozen short of being in equal ground, although the surprise element had been on their side. But she didn't need to know that – what she really needed was to calm down and get that arm checked and that was what he was going to make sure happened. "Positive," he lied. "Now, you need to sit down before you fall over because you look pale as a sheet."

She had to take his word for it since there weren't really any mirrors in sight for her to check her own alleged paleness. She didn't fight, him once he put one arm around her back and walked her over to one of the table's chairs, half because she really was tired, half because of that effect he seemed to have on her whenever he was close…

"Alright," he said once she was sitting. "Wait here for a second. I have to go outside send Patronuses to the others telling them you're with me just in case they're still looking for us, okay?"

"Okay," she agreed. She didn't bother asking why he needed to go _outside_ to do it. Later she'd wonder if it was because the charm might work better if it didn't require the Patronus to go through walls or something or because he'd needed a moment to settle himself. She was inclined to go with the second – Merlin knew how many deep breaths she had to take once she saw herself alone in order to keep herself composed.

She waited for about a couple of minutes before she started feeling uncomfortably hot – it was only then she noticed the fireplace was lit, as it had been since they'd arrived. It seemed very unlike Molly to leave a fire up in an empty house, even though fireplaces in the Wizarding Worls usually had spells to keep the flames from spreading away from them. Soon enough, though, Izzy concluded that the woman must have left in such a hurry to help them that keeping a tidy kitchen, as she always did, had certainly been the last thing in her mind: the dirty dishes on the counters and half a pan of cold eggs on the table were enough proof of that.

Leaving observation aside, Izzy stood from her chair, still cradling her injured her and tried to figure out how to get out of her cloak. As if she hadn't already figured out that wasn't going to be an easy task, the pain on her left arm certainly warned her of that once she ceased using the other one to cradle it. Merlin, it seemed to weigh a ton all of a sudden, once it was left unsupported.

"_Didn't I tell you to sit down?_" she heard George saying behind her just as he slipped back into the house through the back door.

"I was sitting down," she replied, going back to cradling the arm. "I just need to get out of this cloak."

"Well, let me give you hand with that," he offered once he moved to stand just in front of her. "I've got good news." His lips couldn't help curling just a little once he saw her face immediately lighting up. "I got a Patronus from Fred even before I could send mine. He says he's with Mum and Dad and that they've got Ginny."

"And my Mum? The others?" she asked.

He shook his head. "Still haven't heard from them. But they should say something once they receive mine. Don't worry yourself out yet."

She sighed. "Better said than done", she mumbled. "But if your parents are okay and so are Ginny and Fred, why aren't they home yet? Where did they go?"

George shrugged. "I dunno. They're probably taking care of something. We avoid mentioning locations in the messages in case someone overhears them. Someone's bound to pop by here at some point, though – it's a pretty obvious place to start looking."

He did have a point there, Izzy thought. She really couldn't deny it.

"How did you get to me?" she suddenly wondered. "I must have run for like a mile – how did you keep up for so long with the Death Eaters on a tow?"

"I didn't," he replied. "I lost you about a hundred yards in. Your Dad managed to keep up and go after them but I just couldn't, so I had to take a chance – I apparated a few hundreds of yards ahead on the direction you were heading, hoping you wouldn't start zigzagging or something and catch up with me instead. I really had no idea if I was going to find you that way…"

"And still you did," she mumbled. It must've been the Felix, she thought. It must have been guiding her there, straight to the place George had apparated on. For the first time that day, she really _did_ feel lucky.

George nodded. "I was a bit ahead of where you were but I heard you coming. Then, there you were, at the top of the hill right before you fell. It was bloody close, Isabelle. Too bloody close. I thought you'd broken your neck on that fall."

"Just my arm," she mumbled, though the word 'just' seemed quite out of context, given the pain she felt.

"Right. Well, how bad does it feel, anyway?" he asked, changing the subject.

She attempted to pass it off with a shrug but the shoulder movement alone made her wince.

"That bad, then," he mumbled.

"It wasn't so bad before," she commented.

"I bet it wasn't," he mumbled, rather unconvinced. "Well, we need to try and move it as little as possible. It might be broken. Can you move the hand?"

She flexed her fingers with some difficulty. "I suppose. It feels weird, though."

"That's probably normal," he assured her. "You'll have to let go of the arm, though, so I can slip the good one out of the sleeve."

She nodded and did so, allowing him stand behind her as he slowly tried to pull the cloak out of her good arm without shifting the cloth around too much, mindful of the injured one. "I've never broken anything before," she mumbled, trying to ignore the pain.

"Lucky you," George told her with a light chuckle. "Let's just say Fred and I together probably broke more bones between us than the rest of the Weasley clan together."

She tried not to smile at that – it seemed like such an inappropriate thing to do when she should be – and, to be fair, was – in angst over her family's safety. But she couldn't help it, really. It was hard to keep her mind from trying to picture all the different ways those two had discovered to break bones. "Why am I not surprised?"

"Hey! We were beaters. Believe it or not, we weren't born with flawless aim," he replied, moving to stand opposite her, halfway through freeing her from the cloak. "This is probably going to sting a little. The arm must be swollen. This sleeve will be hard to pull."

"Just do it," she replied.

He nodded for a moment before touching her good arm and lifting it until her hand was resting on his shoulder. When she gave him a questioning look, he spoke. "Grasp my shoulder if it hurts too much. I kind of need both hands for this…"

She nodded in return and braced herself for pain. She couldn't say it didn't come after all – it did. But it certainly wasn't as bad as she'd expected it to be. He was incredibly tender with his touch, carefully pulling on the sleeve while at the same time using his other arm to keep hers secured. She found herself grasping his shoulder once or twice but was certain she'd hardly leave him with a bruise.

When he finally managed to take the cloak off, he threw it onto a nearby chair without a thought, his full attention on her arm, and they sat down and he started folding up the thankfully loose-fitting sleeve of her jumper. They found her forearm badly bruised and considerably swollen, as George had predicted.

"Yep, it's definitely broken," he told her.

Izzy groaned. "Merlin," she mumbled.

"Yeah – bummer. On the other hand, coming out of a kidnap attempt with just a broken arm seems like a good bargain, if you asked me."

She sighed. "I have your Christmas present to thank for that, I suppose."

That time, he met her eyes, his lips curling s little. "You used the Felix. I told you it would come handy."

She nodded. "It did. You saw how all those spells missed me by just a little. And I shared it with Ginny too… and Mum."

"Why are you losing your mind with worry over here, then?"

"I didn't _see _her taking it. There was little of it – we couldn't take it too early and waste the effect."

"She had it nevertheless – your mother's a smart lady, Isabelle. She would have taken it."

Izzy sighed. "It's still not fool-proof, though. I did get a broken arm."

"Yeah, but you've still got a head on your shoulders. I'm not sure if you noticed but taking that fall was basically the only thing that kept you away from what I'm pretty sure was a nasty severing curse. Because I _did _and, trust me, that makes a broken arm look like a paper-cut."

She gulped. He didn't look like he was kidding. At all.

Before any of them could say anything else, though, the silvery form of a lynx erupted through the room, stopping just a couple of feet away from then before it spoke.

"_Mission accomplished with no losses,"_ Kingsley's voice sounded through the spectrum in a heavy, commanding and straight-to-the-point tone – likely the one he used all the time as head-auror. "_Mia and the girls are safe and sound. For those still in the field, retreat somewhere safe. Those already out, stay under the radar until we have more information. If you're injured, contact us for help. Thank you for your help today. It was absolutely invaluable." _And, with the message passed along, instead of fading away, as message-patronuses usually did, that one just turned around and seemed to travel somewhere else to keep spreading the message.

As soon as it was gone, Izzy finally allowed herself to breathe in relief.

"I told you they were alright," George stated. "Give it a few minutes and your Mum will be right here, fussing all over you."

Her lips curled just a little. "I know."

"And you know what this means," he prompted.

She raised her eyebrows at him. "What?"

He grinned. "That, once again, I'm right. As always."

She rolled her eyes. "Weren't you in the middle of something right before that Patronus showed up?" she asked. "Something about broken arms and paper cuts.

"Right. Both things I can fix, by the way," he said, reaching back for his wand as he gave in to her attempt at changing the subject. "Just give me a moment to think back to the charm Lockhart taught us…"

"Lockhart?!" she asked in alarm before noticing how hard he was biting his lip to keep himself from snorting. She glared, promptly trying to kick him and missing by an inch. "Don't mock me. I'm hurt!"

"Come on, Isabelle – as if we've have ever learned anything from that useless idiot other than how to get ourselves stuck in a loony bin," he told her. "Don't worry, I know a decent spell for this. If we had to go to Mum every time we smashed a few bones, she'd have never let me or Fred move out." He noticed the nervous look on Izzy's face and sighed. "Listen, we can wait a little longer for your parents to show up and let your mother fix it but…"

Izzy shook her head. "No, don't bother. The sooner it's fixed, the better," she told him, determined. "I trust you."

George's lips curled a little. "Okay," he mumbled. "Take a deep breath because this is by no means a pleasant thing to feel. Especially if it's broken as badly as I think it is…"

"Just do it," she told him. He'd told her basically the same about removing the sleeve and it hadn't hurt half as much as she'd…

Before she even noticed George whispering the charm, a blinding pain took over her arm, about three or four times worse than the one she'd felt when it had been broken in the first place. Her body spontaneously crumbled forward on the chair from the shock of the pain and she cursed heavily under her breath.

The sudden ache left as quickly as it went, though it left a pronounced echo behind, but she still found herself taking deep breaths as she leaned on her forehead with her eyes closed. "Merlin," she mumbled.

"_It's okay_," she heard George's voice saying surprisingly closely. "_The worst part is over. It will hurt for a few days but not nearly as much_."

It was only when she opened her eyes again that she registered why his voice sounded so close – somehow during the intense explosion of pain, her forehead had ended up leaning against his shoulder. And, against all instinct, instead of pulling back just as soon as she realized it, Izzy didn't. Instead, she actually held closer, wrapping her good arm around his neck, feeling he was the one thing keeping her together as everything came crashing down on her like a train.

It was ridiculous, she thought for a second. She knew she was alright, she knew everyone had made it okay… and yet her mind all of a sudden simply couldn't let go of what had happened. They'd tried to take her and her mother that day, like they'd taken Luna all those months before. Why? To kill them? To hurt them? To hurt the people close to them? They'd failed, she knew, but she felt the one defeated: she couldn't go back to Hogwarts, she knew her family was about to become a bunch of fugitives, she knew they wouldn't be able to come out of hiding for who knew how long… It felt like the world was crumbling under her feet and it was too much – just too much. Why couldn't her life be normal? Why couldn't it be simple?

Before she knew it, she heard herself sniffing and felt the tears tickling her face. _Crap_, she thought. She was crying. She was crying on _George_'s shoulder.

If that bothered him somehow, though, he didn't show it. In fact, he did the opposite: he wrapped his arms around her and held her close. She doubted he was able to read her mind but she could tell from the tone of his voice that he was comforting her about far more than an aching arm. His hand tentatively touched her hair, stroking it in a comforting manner as he mumbled that it was going to be okay. Whatever he meant by that, she believed it when he said it, even if just for a little moment. Even as her sobs gradually ceased, she didn't let go – he made her feel safe and at home and, at that moment, she didn't want that feeling to stop. She didn't want to let go. Ever, preferably.

She soon realized that wasn't really an option as, seconds later, she found him pulling back just a little, though the hand that had been rubbing her back until a few seconds before moved to cup her cheek. She averted her eyes from him, keeping her face down. She knew it didn't make sense – he'd probably heard more about her feelings during the past few months than anyone else and yet there she was, not wanting him to see her looking weak.

He seemed to agree with the lack of sense of her actions as he soon tenderly lifted her face until she was looking him in the eyes. "Are you okay?" he asked in a mere whisper.

She found herself speechless for a few seconds – something in the blue of his eyes ruled her quite unable to answer… or maybe just far too distracted. She imagined her mind was still a bit drunk on the feeling of him holding her so close.

"Isabelle," he insisted, a look of concern on his face.

She gulped, making herself snap out of it, and nodded. "I'm fine," she replied.

But still he didn't let go of her face. "No," he mumbled. "You really aren't." But he didn't say more than that. Instead, he just kept looking at her, as if he was waiting for something.

She found herself holding her breath for a moment and _knew _what was going to happen before it actually did. And she did nothing to stop it – not when his hand shifted to her neck and his arm circled her back, not when he leaned forward, not when his lips touched hers for the second time in her life. She _wanted _it. She wanted it so badly…

It was soft at first, as if he expected her to break into pieces again at any moment, but quickly it grew fiercer. Like they were trying to prove something that neither of them was sure what was… It was nearly impossible to compare that kiss to the one they'd shared at the platform all those months before – it felt so much more intense and so much more… them. Not that the other one hadn't been amazing as well – she just didn't know it back then. That her 'crush' was so much more than that. But now she did – now she did and she never wanted it to stop

At some point, they had to break the kiss, having apparently forgotten how to breathe in such an occasion. They didn't look at each other, then. They just stood there, breathing hard and thinking a thousand thoughts a minute.

"Isabelle, I…" he started.

But, suddenly, Izzy didn't want to hear it. She knew he was going apologize or call the kiss stupid like last time… and, Merlin, she really didn't want him to. So, she took the bold step that time… she kissed him again.

It seemed to catch him by surprise but he didn't push her away in any case… If possible, the kiss grew even bolder than before. Hands other than the one attached to her still aching arm didn't seem to stay on one place. They moved in deliciously intense motions and, Merlin, she knew if she ever had to kiss someone else, it'd feel like nothing in comparison. Then again, she thought… she hoped she might never have to.

She felt hot and cold at the same time, breathless and full of air… the pain in her arm was a mere itch in her mind. In reality, it probably wasn't but she didn't care – it'd take far more than a recovering broken arm to get her to care about anything but that kiss at the moment. The kiss and what came after – Merlin, that part was terrifying. Because that was it, wasn't it? She was putting herself out there and clearly so was he. That was the moment it could all change.

Once their lips broke apart again, none of them really spoke. They just sat there, foreheads touching while they caught their breaths at the same time they tried to figure out what to do next.

Before any of them could utter a word, though, the house's door burst open and they instinctively pulled as apart as they could possibly be while still sitting next to each other.

"Oh, crap," Fred mumbled from the door, once he noticed the looks on their faces and got a slight image (it was mostly wishful thinking) of what they'd been up to.

"Damn it, Fred!" George hissed at his twin.

"Sorry, I wasn't really expecting to… no, scratch that," Fred stated. "Actually I'm not sorry. Wanna know why? Because Mum, Dad and Sirius are right on my heel, so you should actually be thanking me for being the first through the door."

"_Freddie, are they there?_" they heard Molly asking from outside.

"See? Just saved your hide. You're welcome, by the way," he told his brother before poking his head back out and answering his mother.

And just like that, the perfect moment was ruined, Izzy thought with some disappointment. When she glanced over at George, she could see he was thinking the same. He reached for the hand of her good arm and gave it a little tug. "Next time we're alone?" he asked her with a grin.

She couldn't help smiling at the prospect and at the fact that George was all but assuring her there'd be a follow up to that kiss. "Next time," she promised right before Molly burst into the room, starting her motherly fussing on either of them almost immediately.

"Dad," she said as soon as she saw him stepping into the room and making his way to her, immediately scooping her into a bone-crushing hug, which couldn't have come at a worst time. "Ouch, ouch," she mumbled. "Injured arm."

He immediately let go of her. "What?" he asked, eyeing her in alarm. "Where? How?"

"I fell down," she said, showing him her left arm. "It was broken but George fixed it. Still hurts, though." She glanced over at George, who stood leaning against the counter, and he shot her a little smile, which he hid seconds later behind a cough once he saw her father looking over as well.

"I don't think I can thank you enough for getting her out of there," Sirius told George.

"Oh, it was nothing," he mumbled awkwardly, desperately trying to find an excuse to avert looking at him. "Team effort. I need to…" he didn't finish, pointing at the nearest door before heading out, Fred quickly following after him, looking he might just burst into laughter at any second.

"So, where's Ginny?" Izzy asked just after the twins made their exit.

"We took her to Molly's Aunt Muriel's house," Arthur told her. "I think it's safer if we stay there for a while now."

Oh, Ginny was going to _hate _that, Izzy immediately thought.

"Honestly, it was dreadful today but it may have just been for the best," Molly said. "Merlin knows what tragedy might have happened to you girls if you'd stayed in that school much longer."

That didn't make Izzy feel much better. They might be out but their friends were still in, now fighting without them. She felt a little bad they hadn't taken the time to say goodbye to Neville, at least. They'd mostly avoided him that morning, in fact – he knew them well enough to have noticed something wrong with their demeanour if he was around them too long. No doubt he would have wanted to help but she and Ginny had decided not to involve the DA in their escape soon after being given the news – they couldn't risk the Death Eaters suspecting their friends had helped and leave them to pay the consequences of them escaping.

"I suppose we should head home now," Sirius soon said, checking his watch.

"Oh, of course – Mia's bound to be anxious to see her," Molly stated. "Let me just get the boys to say goodbye." She headed to the door, shouting the twin's names shortly after leaving the room, and returned a few seconds later with her sons in a tow.

Fred's goodbye was rather short, based around a friendly pat on the back and wink, after which he headed over to her father, in order to shake his hand and start some conversation – she had a feeling he was trying to distract him, as well as his parents, from her and George. If that was the case, she was thankful.

"So…" George mumbled. "Until next time, I guess."

She smiled. "I look forward to it." And so, after making sure Fred had everyone's full attention – he was _good_, she vaguely noted, having even strategically made sure they conveniently had their backs turned to them, so he was the only one who had any chance of what went on in their general area – she moved closer to George and kissed him… just on the cheek, though. Her father was still in the room, after all. "And thanks for saving my life," she added. "Again."

He grinned. "Always at your service, Isabelle."

She re-joined her father by everyone else's side, having to make an effort to hide her smile. "Ready, Izzybel?" he asked her.

She nodded. "Let's go."

They managed to slip out of the house after a few minutes of convincing Molly it was not necessary for anyone to walk them to the edge of the house-wards radius, since complicated blood-binding wards wouldn't let Sirius apparate from within them.

"So, Mum really is okay?" Izzy asked her father as the two of them walked along the Burrow's yard.

Sirius nodded. "Yeah, she's mostly fine," he said.

Izzy stopped walking, prompting Sirius to do the same. "_Mostly?"_

"She's a bit… confused."

"Confused?" she asked, raising her eyebrows as she resumed walking. "What do you mean by that?"

"She doesn't seem to remember much since last night," he told her. "Well, anything, really."

"What?!"

"You heard me," Sirius said. "She doesn't seem to have hit her head or anything, though – Kingsley brought Elizabeth over and she checked. She just… doesn't remember. Which is not that bad, I guess – Merlin knows I wouldn't particularly hate not remembering this morning."

"Do you think it was a memory charm?" she inquired.

Sirius shrugged. "It seems to fit but it just doesn't make sense, does it? Everything indicates they were planning to kidnap both of you, so why on Earth would they just erase a few hours from your mother's head and let her be?" Especially, he thought, given she'd been found quite vulnerably passed out on the ground.

Izzy shrugged. "I've no idea but, for once, I'm happy that's all they did."

Her father sighed. "Yeah. Me too," he agreed. "We're here. You know the drill, right?" he asked, just as they crossed the wards' barrier.

She nodded, lacing her right arm with his, while at the same time using it to secure the previously broken one. The apparition didn't feel as bad on it as it had last time, but it wasn't exactly pleasant either – safe to say she was glad once she found herself standing on the front step of 12 Grimmauld Place.

Sirius opened the door for her, quickly urging her in so he could close it behind them – he might know the front porch was already covered by the wards but only inside the house did he feel safe enough to let his guard down.

"I hope you know that we can't let you go back to school after this," he said softly as he they stood in the entrance hall.

Izzy nodded. "I know," she mumbled.

"And you know that we have to stay underground too, right?" he said.

She nodded again. "We don't have to move, though, do we?" she asked. "This place is a fortress with all the wards – we can hardly find anywhere safer, can we?"

Sirius shook his head. "No, you're right. We're staying – if the current wards aren't enough, the Fidelius Charm we'll be adding is bound to do the trick."

"Wait, a Fidelius Charm?!"

"It was only a matter of time, Izzybel," he told her. "We could use the extra layer of protection."

"I'm not questioning that, but does it mean we have to keep everyone out?" she asked, a bit frantic. All of a sudden, the 'next time' she and George had promised to each other was threatening to move a long way down the road… "The Weasleys, for instance, are trustworthy – we can let them in on the secret, can't we?"

"We could, but I think that's going to be a little bit hard," he stated.

"How hard?"

"They're going under a Fidelius Charm too, love," he said. "By the time we set the charm here, odds are we won't even remember where they are."

**A/N2: In my defence, they did kiss... a lot. Feedback is welcome. Review!**


	61. Cheers

**A/N: I cannot believe I am posting this chapter two whole weeks late. it's my own fault this time. Should have warned you I might have gone on vacation, though I was all but set on cancelling because of Dad's surgery. He made me go, though, and good thing I did - a two-week inter-rail though central and eastern Europe is the most amazing adventure I've ever experienced so far. I'd advise it on anyone who has the chance to do it.**

**Anyway, this is a less action-packed chapter... you could call it the calm before the storm. that could have been the title of the chapter, really...**

**Thank you for your patience and well-wishes. Enjoy!**

There were very few sounds Severus Snape could say actually made his skin crawl. In fact, aside from the sound of students whispering around during his lectures, one of the few sounds he placed in such a category, he hardly had to deal with such sounds in a daily basis, which he was more than happy with. Logics said that if a sound made his skin want to crawl away, the longer he spent without hearing it, the better.

Logics had it wrong.

For the first time in his life, a sound that usually not only made his skin want to crawl away but also made him vaguely wish to combust into flames seemed like music to his ears: Bellatrix Lestrange was laughing. Hysterically so, sounding as mad as they came and as sickening as always.

For once, that didn't bother him at the least – that actually made him relish. Because she had a good reason to laugh and even better targets to laugh at: Alecto and Amycus Carrow.

"Oh, you're in trouble," she mocked, walking around the two Death Eaters as they sat on a couple of chairs at the Malfoy Manor's dinner table, too weakened to stand – spending over half a day passed out in the woods, no food or water, did that to a person. Snape didn't pity them for it, just as he didn't pity them for being in the wrong end of Bella's mocking. "Big, _stinking_ trouble. Let me see… disobeyed Daddy's orders," she started, nodding at Snape, "ruined his plan, got taken down by a lone woman and even managed to lose your wands…" She whistled. "Master's not going to be happy."

"Shut up, Bella," Amycus said under his breath before turning on the chair so he was facing the door. "Is that bloody pepper-up potion going to find its way here eventually, Narcissa?!" he yelled towards it.

Before he could even see it coming, Bellatrix was slapping him. Her wand was on his face before he could even try to reply in the same manner. "Watch your manners in other people's houses," she said. Amycus glared but stayed put – he was an idiot, but not enough of one that he'd think he had any chance against Bellatrix Lestrange without a wand.

Snape rolled his eyes from the spot where he stood against the wall. As if she cared anything about manners – she just felt like taking her own jab at them before their master arrived and stole them from right under her nose.

Narcissa strolled into the room seconds later, calmly announcing they'd run out of potion, throwing the least convincing apology he'd ever heard into the statement. Snape had a feeling there was no potion lack of pepper-up potion in that house – Narcissa just wasn't willing to share it with a couple of idiots who'd been less than gracious with the Malfoys when they'd fallen from grace. He imagined she was enjoying watching them in the same situation now, a thought that was all but confirmed by a little curl of her lips as she moved to join her husband at the table.

"Why didn't you think to take her wand away, anyway?" Lucius questioned, newly-confident with the new odds of not being at the bottom of the pyramid anymore with the Carrows' failure. "It's basic logic – when you take someone against their will, take their weapons first. A Muggle could tell you that," he stated, as if Muggles made the best example of stupidity other than the Carrows themselves.

Neither Alecto nor Amycus responded – they wouldn't know what to say, anyway.

"Oh, that's right," Bellatrix said with a cackle. "You wouldn't remember, would you? She obliviated you too. Wonder what else she did…"

"Can't you just be quiet for one moment?" Alecto snapped. "Why don't you redirect your little comments to Snape instead? He was the one in charge."

"_He_," Snape said, "gave your orders, which you chose to ignore. You were to wait for my signal to take Black and I'd escort her personally into this manor's dungeon – but what did you do instead? You ventured on your own, didn't even think of unarming her and Amelia Black ran away. Congratulations." Of course, he hadn't been surprised they'd ignored his orders – orders he'd made certain were heard by many other ears in case their amnesia came into question.

Months of handling them had taught him that using just the right amount of insult and superiority when giving an order would set their tempers off. Add a little hint that he'd be taking the credit for the success of the mission and be able to step on them even more than he already did and it would make it irresistible for them to turn the tables and take the credit for themselves. He had, of course, taken into account the possibility that they might not fall for the trap and arranged half a dozen of contingencies but, oh, had they fallen right on their faces…

Everyone got on their feet and stood straight as an arrow once Draco Malfoy appeared in the room, announcing he'd seen the Dark Lord arriving at the gates from his bedroom window. Not a minute later, he was making his way into the Dining Room, all flowing black robes and unreadable expressions.

First, the snake-faced man looked at the two Carrows, then at him – Snape held steady on his feet and kept his mind just as closed at it always was, despite it. Truth was, he wasn't quite sure part of the blame wouldn't fall on him. He'd done what he could in what came to turning the Carrows into the main scape goats of their failure to capture Amelia and Isabelle Black – no one deserved that more than them for what they did to harmless children every time his attention had to shift away from them. But he knew, though, that there was no one more volatile than his master – he could easily twist things into him being to blame as well and punish him accordingly.

Snape couldn't care less about the punishment – not unless it involved stripping him of his position at the school. Protecting the students was his priority and if doing so led to him being on the wrong end of a few Cruciatus curses, it was a price worth paying.

"Severus," the dark lord called after a few seconds of silence. His eyes were fixed on the Carrows at the moment and they were starting to sweat.

Snape approached him like a good minion, promptly bowing. "My lord," he responded.

There was another moment of silence – for a second there, Snape was sure it meant his master was holding him responsible for the failure above everyone. He braced himself to take whatever sentence was dictated for that – he'd saved two people that time around… three, counting young Ginny Weasley. As far as he was concerned, it was worth getting punished for.

"I understand Hogwarts has been on break as of yesterday," the Dark Lord stated, making everyone raised their eyebrows – that was about the last thing anyone was expecting him to say. Was he making… conversation?!

Snape nodded, barely managing to hide his surprise. "Since yesterday, my lord. Classes shouldn't resume for a week."

Voldemort nodded. "So, am I to assume you won't need your co-deputy-headmasters until then?"

The Carrows went blank as a couple of sheets. Snape's face became expressionless. "I suppose I could manage without them for a week, yes," he responded, all but offering those two in a silver platter.

"Good. Because Professors Carrow will be spending their break with me," Voldemort stated.

Carrow's faces became even whiter, Bella let out some sort of satisfied giggle and the Malfoys just smirked.

"My lord," Amycus started. "Please… We…"

Their master pointed his wand at the man and sent him flying across the room, violently hitting the stone wall on the other side of the dinner table. No doubt there would be broken bones to fix from that but no one seemed in a hurry to do so – not even Alecto, who seemed frozen in place.

"_When I tell you to obey someone, you do it even if it turns your ego black and blue!_" their Master shouted loudly enough for people to hear him across the channel in France. "I am your Master – what I say is law!"

"Yes, my l…"

"If I wanted you in charge, I'd have put you in charge," he continued, ignoring Alecto's words. "But why would I do that? Why would I ever put you in charge?" He turned to Bellatrix. "Tell them why I'd put him in charge."

"You wouldn't, my lord," the mad woman said, looking at the Carrows with a hint of superiority – she seemed to think she was back in their Master's good graces. "Because they're stupid enough to get stunned and obliviated by a woman who should have been unarmed in the first place."

"Good Bella," their master said, making the woman reel. "And, Lucius," he continued without turning to the Malfoys. "Say why I would put Severus Snape in charge."

It was a good thing he wasn't looking at the malfoys, Snape thought, because if he was, he wouldn't have missed the look of disgust on their faces over Lucius being asked that question in particular.

"Lucius?" the Dark lord insisted.

"Because he killed Dumbledore," the other man mumbled through his teeth like someone was trying to pull them.

"There it is," Voldemort says. "Not all of my disciples seem to be lacking a brain. Now, Severus," he added, turning to the former potions Master, "I believe that is all I need from you at the moment. You are dismissed – unless you'd like to stay and watch."

"I would, but I'm afraid I have some commitments back at Hogwarts," Snape stated. "We're in need of a new History of Magic teacher."

His master nodded. "Make sure you search within our circles. And keep an eye on the Blacks' friends in the school. See if try to get in touch."

Snape nodded back. "I will, my lord," he said, bowing before walking out.

He was out of the gates by the time the screaming started.

* * *

**4 April 1998**

"Tell me about it again," Mia requested of her husband once she saw him walking into their room, where she sat at the window seat, looking out.

Sirius frowned. "Mia…"

"Please," she said. "Just one more time."

That was what she'd said last time, he thought. To tell her the story just one more time, which he wouldn't mind, if it was a marginally good story. But it wasn't – it was probably among the worst he'd ever had to tell: the story of how his wife and daughter had narrowly escaped capture by Death Eaters on the day they should've been headed home for Easter break.

It wasn't hard to understand why he didn't particularly like telling it, though he couldn't blame her for wanting to hear it: that whole event was part of a massive hole in her memories that, maybe by making herself hear the story over and over, she was trying to fill up, or at the very least built a bridge over. So far, there were no results and she seemed unable to get past it – to be honest, he was starting to believe there would never be results. She was just torturing herself – he could see the frustration in her face every time he narrated the facts he'd gathered between his and Izzy's accounts of the escape.

But still, he gave in – for the last time, he promised himself. He couldn't let Mia stay indefinitely locked in that cycle. He walked over to the window and took a seat opposite her. She looked at him expectantly, as if she'd never heard what he was about to tell her before – she might remember every word of those previous times, but he could see she was still expecting something new: a new detail, a little something that might help her fill the gap in her memory and move on. He felt a pang in his heart because that look of expectation made it so obvious that losing her memory had made her a little broken. And, as much as he wanted to fix her or give her time to fix herself, it didn't seem to be working. Sighing, he placed his hand over hers on the windowsill.

"On the night before you were supposed to come home, you received a Patronus warning you the Death Eaters were planning to take you, Izzy and Ginny in the morning," he said, calmly reporting the details he already his daughter had filled him with days before.

He could have lied, he supposed. He could have simplified the whole thing, censored the worst parts and saved himself the trouble of having to tell such a long and complicated story, even though he hadn't predicted he'd have to be so repetitive about it. Honestly, she probably would have taken it in much better if he'd painted the whole thing much more colourfully and wrapped it with a bow of praising. But he didn't. Someone had erased the memories of half a day of her life – a rather eventful, certainly important, half day. That seemed like enough of a violation without him adding to it by lying to her about what had happened. So, he told her things exactly the way he'd learnt them, as unbiased as he could, leaving it up to her to judge the meaning of things.

She listened to him with the same focus she'd worn the first time he'd narrated the tale, not interrupting him once. He felt the same pang of regret he'd felt the first time he told her about how she'd tried to contact him and was unsuccessful because he'd failed to carry the two-way mirror with him or give it to someone who could answer it, as well as guilt when he shared that the likely reason for the Death Eater's sudden interest in taking the girls was the rescue mission he'd rushed Kreacher into.

"When you left the castle, you were just waiting for the chance to get the girls and apparate away," he continued. "McGonagall was with you at first but the Carrows must have managed to lure her away because somehow you ended up on your own with them. I'm not sure what they said or did from then on but they got you to follow them out of school grounds. From then on, all I know is that Kingsley and your parents found you unconscious on your own several yards off-path. You had your wand on you and the Carrows were nowhere to be seen. I guess you managed to over overthrow them. There weren't sighs of head trauma or anything, but when you woke up…"

"I didn't remember any of it," Mia finished for him, sighing.

"You didn't," he said, pausing for a moment. "Did hearing it juggle anything this time?"

She shook her head and pulled her hand away from his and onto her lap, a frustrated look on her face – it didn't surprise him. He didn't think it would in the first place. And, honestly, he was starting to wonder if that mattered: maybe her moving on wasn't so much about remembering what she'd forgotten but rather what she didn't.

"Love," he said. "You've got to stop doing this to yourself. Everything points to a memory charm being the reason you lost your memory of that day – making yourself hear over and over and over again what happened more than likely won't bring anything back."

"No, but it might make me… understand."

"Understand what?"

She looked away, out of the window, as if she was trying to break the conversation along with the eye contact. "Never mind. It doesn't matter."

"Of course it matters," he replied immediately, taking her hand again. "Tell me. What do you need to understand?"

There was a clear moment of hesitation before she spoke. And, when she did, though her eyes moved away from the window, they didn't meet his, remaining fixed on her lap, where his hand rested on hers. "What I was thinking," she said. "What I was thinking that made me let everything go so… _wrong_."

Sirius frowned. "What do you mean 'let everything go wrong'? You didn't let anything go wrong – things went wrong because Death Eaters tried to kidnap you, not because you lured them to you or anything."

"No, but I knew they were coming. I was warned. And I wasted it," she said, that time looking him in the eye.

"You didn't waste it, you warned us. You got the girls to send a message to the twins and they got us to go there and get you. Which we did. What else were you supposed to do?"

"Get them and run. Start a riot when they weren't expecting it. Throw the bloody walls around the castle down or dig a hole under them. _A__nything, _just as long as it got us out."

"None of that would have possibly worked…"

Mia got up, frustrated. "You can't know that for sure unless you try. And I didn't – apparently, I just sat there and waited to be saved. Why would I do that? Why would I let us cut it so close, Sirius?"

"But you still made it out in one piece. All of you. Which is a victory in my book. Love, as depressing as it sounds, cutting it close is a good thing these days. It's a bloody war – anything other than a loss is positive. Plus, there's 'cutting it close' and there's 'cutting it close while under the influence of Felix Felicis'."

"No!" she said firmly, shooting him an angry look – the mention of the potion hit a nerve, though she hadn't been particularly sensitive about it up until then. "There's cutting it close. Period. Maybe that was the problem – the potion. There's a reason why people don't use it on a daily basis, Sirius, and it's not just because it's poisonous in large quantities. The mere idea of it makes you overconfident. You make sloppy plans and expect the potion to make them work. Maybe that's what happened: I trusted the potion too much. I was lucky, so why try too hard? Everything would work out – and did it work out… I got myself caught by the Carrows and left Izzy and Ginny to fend for themselves."

Sirius sighed. "Has it occurred to you that maybe it was all part of some plan?" he offered. "Give yourself over to the Carrows so they'd turn their attention away from the girls or something… Sounds like something you'd do – not that I'd approve, mind you."

"It wasn't a plan," she said quickly, starting to pace around in front of her sitting husband.

"How can you possibly sound so sure about that? You don't _remember,_" he asked her.

She paused, looking at him. "I wouldn't have this nagging feeling that I did something wrong if that was the case."

"What?" Sirius asked in confusion. "That doesn't make any sense."

"Yes, it does, Sirius. I used to be a healer, remember?" she pointed out. "My specialty was spell-damage: I've dealt with more people who were obliviated than I can count and, many times, even when the memories were gone, feelings remained. Like… when this auror was accidentally hit with a memory charm and forgot the last ten years of her life. Once she landed her eyes on her kids – kids she'd had during those ten years – she just knew they were hers. If you asked her how old they were, what they were called or what their favourite food was, she wouldn't be able to tell you. But that feeling that was left behind… she knew they were hers. And I know I failed. I don't know how for sure, I don't know why but I know I should have tried harder. I just… know."

Sirius wasn't one to give up – Merlin helped him if he ever did. But, hearing that tone, he started to realize that maybe convincing her she'd done nothing wrong wouldn't be the way for her to move on. No, she didn't need denial. She needed forgiveness. "Okay," he said. "Let's say – for the sake of argument – that you didn't handle things the best way. Let's say you got over-confident. You're not the first and you surely won't be the last person in the world to make a mistake. And that's not even the worst mistake ever made – everyone made it out okay."

"Izzy broke her arm," she replied.

"She did – but it's nothing that can't be fixed. In once pushed my friends to pick a secret-keeper they didn't want and that got them both killed. How do you fix that?"

Mia turned to him in shock – she couldn't believe he was bringing that up. "Sirius, you didn't know…"

"Neither did you," he replied before she could go any further. "You couldn't foresee how your plan would turn out, as bad or brilliant as it might have been. And, to be honest, if you could have foreseen it, I wouldn't mind if you hadn't changed a thing. Because, maybe it wasn't the best plan but it led to the best outcome, which is you and the girls being alive and safe. So, you need to forgive yourself for the little things, because it's the big things that really matter this time."

Mia sighed. "How do you forgive yourself for something you can't remember?"

"That goes both ways, Mia," he pointed out. "How can you blame yourself for it in the first place?" He saw her looking down as she took a seat opposite him again. He imagined it was exhausting, the dilemma, the unknown guilt… "Look, if anyone has a right to do it, it's you."

She looked up, confused. "What do you mean?"

"Forgiving yourself, even if you don't remember. Because whatever you think you did wrong, you'd undo if you thought it would make things better, no matter the price for yourself. It's just who you are, Mia. I still say no harm, no foul, but if it's forgiveness you need, so be it. You need to move on, Love. And you need to come home."

The confusion on her face only grew. "I _am_ home."

"Not really," he replied. "You're here but you're not really _here_. You spend your days in this house, either it's eating or sleeping or just walking around, but you're still _there._ Back at Hogwarts, apparently trying to figure out you think you did wrong. You smile when Alex or Mary show you something cute but you don't really pay attention. You go entire conversations I'm not really sure you even remember just replying with one-syllable words that sometimes don't even apply – that is, unless I'm telling you about the escape again. And, oh, you've apparently missed the fact that for the last four days we've been living under the same roof as the pyjama-wearing living dead."

Mia frowned, completely baffled by then. "The what now?"

"The creature formerly known as Isabelle Black," he specified, rolling his eyes. "The one that walks around sulking in pyjamas all day… that is, when she decides to grace us with her presence outside of her room."

"Why? What's wrong with her?"

"I dunno. I asked her once and she just mumbled something about 'timing'. My guess is that it's girl-stuff – no girl likes to talk about girl-stuff with her dad. She needs her Mum, Mia. _We _need you back."

His wife looked at him, a little lost. "I… I didn't even notice. Didn't think…" She paused, a rather remorseful look on her face. "I'm so sorry, Sirius."

He shook his head. "Don't apologize, Love. You needed time – I get it. And you can still have it. Just don't spend all day torturing yourself for something that, in the end of the day, turned out just fine. Try to spare us a few hours every once in a while. We miss you. Merlin, _I _miss you. Ridiculously, for someone who's been sleeping next to you for the past four nights." He just looked at her for a moment before sighing and stretching his arm towards her. "Come here."

She took his hand and allowed him to pull her out of her seat to sit sideways on his lap instead. She wrapped one arm around his shoulders, resting her side against his chest and felt her lips curling just a little once she recognized the familiar warmth of being so close to him.

"There's that smile," he said, grinning himself before pulling her into a soft, slightly tentative kiss. For the first time in days, she had the presence of mind to respond and it immediately made her feel a little bit better. "Let's never do this again," he mumbled once they broke apart.

She looked at him with raised eyebrows. "Kissing?"

"Merlin, no," he said, mildly horrified. "No one's keeping me from kissing you until I'm dead and buried. Maybe even afterwards, depending on how the afterlife works out. I meant going our separate ways. Let's never do that again unless we really, _really _have to. As in our lives depending on it. Or the kids'."

"We sort of had to this time," Mia pointed out.

"Or we could have set our first-born's wrath by keeping her home, as scary as it was," Sirius replied.

His wife gave him a look. "You know that wouldn't be right. We'd be making her turn into a fugitive."

"She _is _a fugitive," he stated. "We all are now."

"Yes," Mia agreed. "But she still had those months, maybe not completely free but at least able to be with her friends. It wouldn't be right to clip her wings sooner than we had to."

Sirius sighed but didn't disagree. "Well, it's done now, regardless," he stated. "And we're together. We're safe. We're home."

She just eyes him oddly for a second. "You sound very positive about it, for someone who is resigned to spend his day inside this house for an undetermined period of time," she couldn't help noticing. She knew her husband well, and anything but him going stir-crazy over being a prisoner in his own home would be completely out-of-character.

"Hey, don't ruin it yet," he warned her. "The whole, 'we're under a Fidelius Charm now so we have to sit on our bums for Merlin-knows-how-long' is still settling in. For now, I'm in the whole 'glad we're all okay' phase. I mean, really – we're _all _okay. You and me, Izzy, the little ones and _even Harry. _He may not be under our roof right now but we know he's among friends and that he's perfectly fine. How long has it been since we could say that?"

Mia's lips curled. "A while," she agreed, before her face soured again. "But you know it won't last forever. Harry won't stay put for long while the war rages – it's just not him."

"Oh, hush, woman," he told her, rolling his eyes. "I know that. Of course _I know that. _But we're all fine now and that's been getting me through the day, even with a zombie-daughter and absent-minded wife. Enjoy it too for a while before it gets old. Don't ruin the present by worrying too much about the future."

With a small sigh, his wife rested her head against his shoulder. It occurred to her he had a point there – the present was to be lived, not wasted with regrets and possibilities. "That's actually a very wise thing for you to say."

"Why's the tone of surprise? I'm wise," he said, sounding more than a bit offended.

Mia looked up at him and smiled. "Of course you are."

"Hey!" he complained. "No patronising the wise man. I'll have you know that in all my wisdom, I even designed the perfect method to have our Mary eating her vegetables every meal without a fuss."

"All of them?" she asked, sceptically.

"_All_ of them. Including the broccoli. Impressive, hum?"

She made a non-committal sound riddles with scepticism. "Would you mind sharing how you achieved that?"

He grinned. "By turning them all red – she doesn't seem to like the colour green very much. No Slytherin for that one, I predict. In fact, there might be a lion roaring in the horizon for Miss Mary, if we take colours into account. She _loves _red broccoli."

Mia chuckled. "Do they taste any different than the green ones?" she asked out of curiosity.

"I've no idea – you wouldn't catch me dead eating one of those, either it's green, red or yellow with blue stripes. Bloody disgusting, they are. All grainy and… mushy."

She sighed. "Lovely example you make for your children, Sirius Black."

"What? I can't help that I'm not a toddler who can get fooled by oddly-coloured vegetables," he pointed out.

He sounded so much like himself that Mia couldn't help chuckling lightly before reaching to place a kiss on his cheek. "I did miss you."

He grinned. "Oh, I know. You go completely bonkers without me."

"And your ego just gets out of control without me to keep it from swelling too much," she observed.

He ignored that. "So… done with mulling?"

Mia seemed thoughtful for a second. "Do you know when you have an itch that you can't stop scratching and even though you know it just makes it worse you just won't stop anyway?" He nodded. "Well, I know I need to stop scratching and, so far, I'm succeeding, mostly because I keep barking at myself in my head not to do it. But if I let my guard down for even a moment…"

"… you don't know if it'll stick," he finished for her, receiving a nod in return. "Well," he started, lifting one of her hands to his lips, "I guess we'll just have to keep those hands otherwise occupied."

Mia raised his eyebrows at him. "Metaphorical itches usually require metaphorical hands to scratch them."

He looked absolutely unfazed by it. "Oh, I'm sure if I put enough effort to it, I can keep _all _of you occupied," he assured her, moving his kisses from her hand to her lips. "Metaphorical parts or otherwise."

She smiled against his lips, comforted by his familiar self-assuredness. She used her hand to cup his face and kiss him back, feeling more at home at that moment when he held her so close than she'd ever felt probably since Christmas.

But, being home, there would always be something to interrupt the moment.

"_Daddy_!" they heard an excited little voice calling from the hallway, followed by the sound of little feet running in their room's direction.

Sirius groaned, recognizing his son's calling even before he had a chance to burst into the room. "Do you know when you have a very physical itch that you really want to scratch but the universe doesn't seem to let you?" he whispered to his wife.

Mia chuckled, moving from his lap back to her previous seat after placing one last kiss on his lips. "Be nice," she told him just as Alex burst into the room, dragging his tiny toy broom behind him by the wrong end.

"Daddy, 't's fly time!" the little boy announced.

Sirius raised his eyebrows at his son dubiously. "Do you even know what time it actually is?" he asked the boy.

Alex looked at him in confusion. "'t's fly time," he repeated. The look on his face was so affronted, he might as well have said something like 'Do I stutter, you big dumbo?'

Sirius huffed. It actually wouldn't surprise him if the kid thought 'fly time' was a time of the day that actually showed up on standard clocks – the little bugger was just three, after all.

"Of course it is, honey," Mia told the little boy ignoring her husband's frustration. "Does Mummy get a kiss first, though?"

Dumping the broom on the floor, the little boy grinned as he sped towards his mother, climbing onto her lap with her assistance and placing a sloppy kiss on her cheek. Any neglecting she might have done on his account on the previous days seemed completely forgiven – it was just that easy with him.

Mia smiled as she ran her fingers through her little son's soft hair. "My little boy is getting so big," she told him, a bit nostalgic.

Alex grinned in triumph, turning to his father with a rather mocking expression on his face. "'m big," he stated victoriously.

"Yeah, well, I'm bigger," Sirius told his son in a competitive manner, making the little boy narrow his eyes, as if saying it was on.

Mia let out a little laugh at their interaction. "So, Daddy takes you flying this time every day?"

"Not _every day_. And not at this time," Sirius explained. "He just shows up at random times saying it's 'fly time'. I'm still trying to figure out the logic of this timetable. Especially after he showed up here at half past five in the morning the other day saying it was 'fly time'." He reached forward, ruffling his son's hair playfully. "Little bugger."

Alex giggled in return, turning to his mother. "You cummin' to see too, Mama?"

His mother smiled. "I'll tell you what – you go on with Daddy to get warmed up and I'll join you there in a little while after I have a chat with Izzy."

"Good," Sirius agreed. "Level with the zombie. And see if you get her to stop reading books that sound like a brain injury on paper because that's just disturbing. I mean, the 19-sometthing Encyclopaedia of Merlin-knows-what? The Annual Digest of whatever? Next thing you know, she'll be flipping through a dictionary or something. I'm starting to think she's just trying to freak me out."

"Knowing who she takes after, I wouldn't be surprised," Mia observed.

Sirius narrowed his eyes at her. "Not sure what you're trying to imply," he affirmed, as if he was the most innocent being in the whole world. Getting up, he gave his hand to his little son for him to hold. "Come along, mate."

"Can we take Mary?" the little boy asked.

"What? So she can try to chase yon on the broom and keep on falling on her bum?" his father questioned.

Alex giggled. "'t's funny. An' the floor's soft."

Sirius chuckled. "I suppose it won't hurt, then." Before heading out of the room, Sirius stopped at the doorway and turned around to face his wife. "And this here," he said, gesturing at the general area they'd been snogging on. "To be continued later on."

"You won't hear me complaining," she assured him.

She stayed in the room for a couple of minutes after he left, more or less testing herself to see if the thoughts of guilt and frustration were coming back to flood her mind. They were still there, considerably less pronounced than before, but they didn't seem to be fighting their way out too hard. For the moment, at least.

Satisfied enough, Mia got up and headed out of the room, climbing down the stairs to the floor below. She was surprised not to find Izzy in her room, but instead in Harry's, apparently feeding Hedwig some owl treats.

"I thought Kreacher was keeping her downstairs," Mia observed, making her daughter turn around to face her. Sirius's assessment was at least partially true, Mia observed: Izzy was in her pyjamas, although, at first sight, she could hardly be described as 'the living dead' – typical of Sirius to make it all sound overly-dramatic, probably as some sort of punch-line.

"She seemed a bit depressed down there, so I brought her back up," Izzy told her without turning away from the bird's cage. "I think she misses Harry."

Mia let out a sigh, approaching her daughter. "Don't we all?" she mumbled, reaching into the bag of owl treats in her daughter's hands and feeding one to the owl. "He's okay, though. For now. Or so I'm told," she spoke, not particularly to herself, her daughter or the owl – they all seemed to react to it, though, Hedwig with a little squeak and Izzy with a long sigh.

"You look more… relaxed," Izzy told her mother, changing the subject as she put the treats down on Harry's ridiculously cluttered desk. "Have you remembered anything?"

She shook her head. "I'm trying to convince myself it doesn't matter."

"It doesn't," Izzy stated. "The best that could happen there was us making it out okay, which we did. I wouldn't change a second of it." Of course, her reasons for not wanting to change it were more related to her own particular rescue than the overall events of that day. Merlin knew a flawless escape would likely not have led to the whole thing with George: the rescuing, the comforting, the kissing, the promises and then… She shook her head, reaching the bitter end to a sweet memory, and headed to the door. "You coming, Mum?"

Mia nodded and followed her daughter out of her godson's room, closing the door behind her after a last longing look into the empty chamber that she desperately wanted occupied again. When she reached Izzy's room, she was sitting cross-legged on the bed, holding what seemed to be a blueberry-muffin just about to be eaten.

"Want one?" she asked, nodding at a plane with two or three more of those sitting on her dresser. "I think Kreacher's on one of his missions."

Mia chuckled as she shook her head, moving to sit on the edge of her daughter's bed. There was nothing Kreacher liked more than seeing his young masters happy – Mia suspected there was no one he was fonder of then all four of them – so, at the faintest sign that such might not be the case, the house-elf tended to take it upon himself to try and make them feel better. He did it, of course, in his own way, which usually involved spoiling them with their favourite foods: when Harry was down, they knew treacle tart would be on the menu at least every other day for as long as it took; when it was Izzy, blueberry muffins would just appear out of nowhere for a while. Mia imagined that when Alex's turn came, chocolate cookies would fly around the house – as for Mary, she still hadn't made her favourites known. It was sweet of him, Mia thought, though it hardly did anything very permanent beyond giving them a sugar-rush and a few extra pounds. Vaguely, Mia recalled they'd been having butterscotch pudding after dinner for days – she wondered if it was a coincidence that just happened to be _her _favourite dessert.

"Does he really have a reason for this one?" she asked her daughter.

Izzy didn't respond immediately. "Maybe he just missed me," she suggested, trying to deflect the question.

"Your father seems to think you're acting a little… odd," Mia pointed out.

"Did he use some sort of undead metaphor to tell you that?" Izzy asked.

Mia's lips curled a little. "You know he likes his dramatics."

Izzy rolled her eyes. "I blame it on the telly – he was up watching this film about the living dead a couple of nights ago. Hasn't shut up about it ever since, no matter how many times I tell him that just because I've been wearing pyjamas for a few days – which I change daily, mind you – and have mostly stayed up here, it doesn't mean I'm sulking or… dead on the inside or anything. It's just…" she gestured around, trying to make a point, which came out rather underwhelming for all the build-up "…pyjamas are comfortable," she declared. "Besides, it's not like we're going out of this house anytime soon, is it?"

Her mother could see she was trying to make it all sound very simple when it really wasn't. It was that last sentence that gave it away. "You feel trapped, don't you? You miss your friends," she guessed.

Izzy went quiet for a moment before realizing there was no use denying it or trying to ignore the question. "Yes." Her friends and her… something more, she presumed. That was one of the worst things about having let that conversation with George be interrupted. She wasn't sure what they were anymore. Still friends waiting to be turned into something more? Or maybe something more just waiting to be defined? Should she even presume the 'something more' was really on the horizon? It certainly had felt that way all those days before when they'd basically put it out there but, Merlin, would it crush her if it turned out to be less than she'd predicted…

"If there had been any other way, Izzy, we would have taken it," Mia assured her. "I don't like being under a Fidelius Charm any more than you do – Harry can't find us if he needs us this way, remember? But it was the only fool-proof way we'd be safe: without the charm, if one of us as much as slipped and said the taboo word, they could have stormed the house in the blink of an eye. Now they may show up outside but they can't see it."

"I know," Izzy said. "I know, Mum. But it just…" She paused.

"Just what?" Mia asked.

Izzy sighed. "It just came at the worst possible time."

There was a pause in which Mia tried to figure out what her daughter meant before she asked anything. "What do you mean?"

"Have you ever felt like you'd just found your balance and then someone pulled the rug from right under your feet?"

Mia took a breath. "More times than I can count," she admitted. "But you're going to have to give me a little context here if you want me to understand how this applies to you?"

She eyed her mother for a second and then just went on with it. "George," she said. Why hide it from her anymore? She'd made it very clear back at Christmas that she was aware of her feelings for him.

"George?" Mia asked, frowning. "He was the one to pull the rug?"

"Merlin, no," she said immediately. "No, he… well, I'm not very sure what he is in this metaphor. I guess he could be what gave me the balance before the universe pulled the rug on me." She huffed, not wanting to go into much detail. "I miss him, Mum," she confessed.

"Aw, honey," Mia said, scooting a little bit closer to her daughter and pulling her into her arms. "I'm sure he misses you too. And I promise that just as soon as we have a chance to let you to see him safely, we'll take it." She kissed the top of her daughter's head. "You really fancy that boy, don't you, my love?"

Izzy pulled away a little. Her eyes were dry, but her face was tense like she was forcing herself not to cry – she hated crying. "I don't… I… It's not just fancying. It's… it's more." She paused for a second. "Dad has told you how we managed to contact the Order the other day, hasn't he? Through this roll of papyrus that belongs to Ginny and was paired up with another one the twins had?"

Mia nodded in return. "Yes, it's very ingenious, actually."

"It is," Izzy agreed. "And it was our thing: you and Dad had the two-way mirror; George and I had the papyrus. And we talked… well, wrote, really. A lot – practically every night lately. And it got me through the day – the worst days. I needed someone to talk to – someone who wasn't inside and just in the same situation as I was – and he was always there," she added with a smile. "He always made everything sound so easy, always managed to say something that would make me laugh… He's been the best part of my life for months and now…" She paused, sighing.

"What happened to the papyrus?" Mia asked.

"Ginny had it in her luggage," Izzy said, sadly. "It was hers, really, and I never did think we'd get separated or that we wouldn't be able to see each other after we were safe, so I never thought to get it into mine."

"And now you miss it – talking to him," Mia concluded.

Izzy nodded. "Now I really _needed_ it," she said. "We left things… well, unsolved would be an understatement of massive proportions." One minute 'next time' had been days away at the most, the other it had been so far away she couldn't even see it in the horizon…"

"I know it's not the same but you can always talk to me," Mia assured her.

Her daughter smiled thankfully. "I know. But the conversation I have in mind it's not the kind that can be delegated on someone else," she stated.

Mia pulled her daughter into her arms again, rubbing her back in slow motions, just to remind her that, no matter what, she still had her. Her family. It didn't matter in that case, though – her little girl was in love and it wasn't her she needed that time around. That made her sad and happy at the same time – as far as boys went, George Weasley was a fairly decent one. She couldn't say she fully trusted him – or really anyone but herself – with her daughter's heart but he was certainly far above many people she knew. Maybe it was the little bit of Sirius she could usually see on serial pranksters that made her feel that way.

"I can't fix this one for you, honey," she told Izzy softly once she let her go, minutes later. "I wish I could but I can't. All I can do is being here when you need me."

Izzy gave her a little smile just for the sake of not making her mother feel bad – she was being very honest, after all. "That's okay. I didn't think you could. Conversations can't fix everything, can they? If that was the case, the world would be far less messed up."

"Well, I can at least talk to your father. Make your case about the pyjamas and wanting to spend time with just yourself," Mia offered as she got up from the bed. Spotting a book on her daughter's bedside table, she picked it up and eyed it dubiously. The _1978 Ultimate Guide to Wizarding Travel and Transport_. Well, that was just ridiculous. "Alright, I've got to ask: are you actually reading this or is this book just part of some scheme of yours to spend the time by messing with your father's head? Because, if that's the case, he's starting to suspect."

Izzy forced herself to smile cheekily. "It's fun to watch him squirm and I do need to keep myself entertained," she said. "He almost had a stroke the other day when he first saw me with it. Started looking around for things I might use to attack him in case I was having a mental breakdown."

Mia sighed. "You two are far too alike for your own good," she declared, handing the book back to her daughter. "Do you want to go downstairs and watch your brother fly around on that little broomstick of his?"

"I'll skip on this one," Izzy replied. "He made a point of showing me all his moves yesterday."

"Should I prepare myself to be shocked by the danger?"

"At three feet above the ground and with the floor so padded with charms you could sleep on it?" Izzy asked, sceptically. "You should be more worried about a meteor randomly landing in this very room."

Mia's lips curled. "Good," she said. "Now, be good. And remember I'm always here."

She gave her mother a little nod before she left the room, leaving her there sitting on the bed with the book on her lap. She took a look at the tome in question and felt just a little bit guilty for not telling her mother the truth: that the last reason why she was reading a book on Wizarding transportation was messing with her father's head – she just needed a way out of that house.

Not for that day and probably not for the one after. Odds were, she wouldn't have to use it anytime soon but she knew that, one day, there would come a time when she'd need to leave that house, either it was because she was joining Harry in battle or because she was done waiting for the asylum to end to see George again – and when it did, she needed to know a way to move around quickly and effectively by herself because her guess was that if there was any danger involved, her parents wouldn't be lining up to give her a ride.

It wasn't that they were trying to confine her permanently or leave her completely dependent on them. There were several emergency portkeys to safe locations hidden inside the house that proved otherwise. During the previous summer while Harry perfected his own apparitions, they'd even tried to teach her how to apparate ahead of all her classmates. Saying she was bloody awful at it was putting it lightly, she thought, putting some stress on the 'bloody' part – after having to fix three not-so-unnoticeable splinchings, her mother had put a stop to it, pointing out that maybe she needed some more maturing, else she might lose some body part she really couldn't live without for even a few seconds (for instance, her _head_). Of course, asking them to teach her now wasn't really an option, not only because it would probably lead to some kind of fight or misunderstanding she really had no patience for but also due to the iron-clad anti-apparition wards around the house – she supposed that put a lid on that type of transportation.

But there were plenty more to choose from, thus the book – some were pretty scary, others frighteningly dark. She might just stick with Portkeys, since they seemed the most accurate and least dangerous, not to mention some of the few she could see herself learning successfully from a book – they were, of course, very illegal without the written consent of the Portkey Office except when used for extreme emergencies. She didn't care – it was a war and laws barely applied. Hell, they were hardly respected anymore by the Death-Eater-riddled government itself. Besides, odds were she'd use it in an emergency. "What isn't an emergency these days?" she mumbled to herself.

So, she opened the book again and got to reading – there was no time to lose those days. She knew the time when she'd need that knowledge was coming and Merlin helped her if she wasn't going to be ready.

* * *

Not everything was bad news. They were reminded of that later that day.

It all started with a ring of their doorbell.

In normal circumstances, the ring of a doorbell would be an unremarkable thing – when, due to a fidelius charm, less than half a dozen people were supposed to know where they lived, that didn't apply.

So, it led to, of course a lot of commotion: Sirius running down the stairs, wand in hand; Mia forming a second line of defence midway through the staircase between the door and their sleeping children and Izzy also rushing down, though for less paranoid reasons, mostly centred around the hope the Weasleys had decided to come out of their own hiding and pay a visit.

Later, they'd realize how their reaction was more than a little blown out of proportion: given that the less than half a dozen people who were supposed to as much as be able to see their house just happened to be their closest friends and family, there was little chance anyone with dark motives would be able to ring their doorbell. Especially with Tonks serving as their secret-keeper.

They'd specifically chosen her over equally trust-worthy candidates because she wasn't going anywhere anytime soon and risk getting herself captured and interrogated: the woman was a hundred months pregnant and could barely walk, not to mention that even after the baby came she would probably be stuck in the safety of her own home for a while like any protective first-time parent. On the other hand, Remus, Lulu and Gabe – the other strongest candidates for the job – spent their time running around with the Order, doing errands for them and cutting it close more often than they'd like to admit. So, while there was always some risk involved when someone showed up on their doorstep, at that moment it was as close to minimal as it could get.

"Who is it?" Sirius shouted at the door.

"_It's Remus_," his friends' voice came from the other side of the door. "_I'll save you the trouble of asking the questions and tell you this right away: seven. That's the number of different girls I caught you snogging during prefect patrol in our fifth year_._ I think that's proof enough it's me._"

His eyes widened and he looked up the stairs at his wife and daughter. Mia seemed amused – Izzy didn't.

"_Seven_?" his daughter asked. "You get caught snogging seven different girls in one year and whenever you notice a boy as much as looking at me, you get all touchy?"

"Yes, because I know exactly what they're thinking," he replied.

She huffed and marched back upstairs, yelling down that she was tired and to tell Remus she'd said 'hi', as her father opened the door.

"Thanks a lot for sharing that, mate," Sirius told his friend sarcastically as Mia joined them at the door. Before closing it, he promptly turned to his wife, a diplomatic look on his face. "Before you exile me to the sofa, let me remind you that what he just mentioned happened over twenty years ago," he told his wife.

Mia rolled her eyes. "If I wanted to exile you, I'd have done it a long time ago because Lily actually mentioned ten girls in fifth year, not seven. I distinctively remember it."

"Yeah, well, that's the three times she reported me for when Remus wasn't around to talk her out of it," Sirius pointed out before turning back to his friend. It was only then he noticed the gigantic grin on his face. A grin mixed with a look of mild panic. That could only mean one thing. "Holy crap, Moony, it happened, didn't it?"

"It happened," Remus confirmed, a little stunned.

"You're a dad," Sirius stated, excitedly turning to Mia. "This guy is a _dad_."

"And he'll be very good at it, I'm sure. Congratulations, Remus," she said, motioning to hug the new father in question. "How's Tonks?"

"Amazing. Exhausted. She was out of it when I left – you couldn't tell where the pillows ended and her face begun or vice-versa," he said with a tone of pride in his voice.

"Do you have to go right back? Or can you stay for some tea?"

He nodded. "I can stay for a little while longer. Andromeda is looking after her and the baby. And Dora clearly won't wake up anytime soon."

"Wait, Andromeda came over?" Sirius asked, a hint of surprise in his tone as they made their way to the stairs that led down to the kitchen, Mia leading the way.

Remus nodded. "She didn't have much choice – Dora sent her a howler midway through labour, saying that if she didn't show her face there before her grandchild was born, she'd never speak to her again. I doubt Dora really meant it but Andromeda still came running … and I don't think she'll be going anywhere for a while."

"Took a shine for her little grandson, did she?"

The werewolf narrowed his eyes just as they entered the kitchen, Kreacher nowhere to be seen at the moment. "I didn't say it was a boy."

_Oops_, Sirius thought. "Oh, you know… the way she was standing and the general shape of the bump…" he mumbled, making it up as he went.

"She told you, didn't she?" Remus asked, sitting down hardly surprised.

"Oh, of course she did," Sirius admitted, immediately giving up on the lie. "Honestly, as if I'd be able to tell from the shape of her bump… Is that even a thing?" he asked, turning to Mia.

"I'm not sure. I know Muggles think it can be accurate but we really just use the spell around here," she replied as she put the kettle on and moved to join them at the table. "Have you named him yet?"

Remus nodded. "Ted. After Dora's dad. We've been mostly calling him Teddy now."

"And will I be flattered when I hear the middle name?" Sirius asked, his tone expectant.

The new father rolled his eyes. "Not unless you secretly changed your name to match mine," Remus replied, searching in his jacket.

"Come on… couldn't slip a little 'Sirius' in there? I hear having four names is fashionable," Sirius bated

"Don't be a pest, Sirius," Mia told him uncerimoniously. "Teddy Remus Lupin sounds just right to me. Do you have a picture yet?"

Remus nodded, reaching into an inside pocket of his jacket to fetch it. "I'd almost forgotten about it," he said before placing it on the table so his friends could take a look.

When he laid eyes on the picture, Sirius immediately noted that Teddy Lupin was a tiny little thing, wiggling about in bed as if he was very bothered by all the attention he was getting. There were wisps of light hair on his head and his eyes were the standard newborn blue – it was still hard to tell which parent he took after the most. And it was certainly impossible to see if he'd inherited his father's more unfortunate traits. But Sirius wasn't about to bring that up, of course – his best friend didn't need to be reminded of his furry little problem on what had to be the happiest day of his life so far.

"He's adorable, Remus," Mia said. "Makes you want to hold them forever when they're this little, doesn't it?"

Remus nodded. "Makes you want to protect them with your life," he stated with a sigh. "We'll try to bring him over soon for you to meet him since you can't come over. You're basically his closest family aside from Andromeda and us. It feels right that you'd meet him early."

"Oh, take your time. Don't worry about us – we'll do with pictures until you feel like it's safe enough," Mia told him. "I don't think I took Izzy out of the house for about a month after she was born and back then the most dangerous thing outside was the cold. We understand if you want to keep him indoors for a little while longer." The kettle started to whistle the moment she finished saying that and she got up, heading to check on the tea.

"Well, well," Sirius mumbled once they were left on their own. "Mr. Moony a dad. This completes the circle for a whole new generation of Marauders, leaving out more rotten branches of the group, of course," he said, the last part referring to Wormtail.

Remus was so lost in his own wonder that he didn't even catch the reference. "I guess it does. I'm sure McGonagall will be thankful that not all members of this new generation will be at school at the same time." That was, assuming there would even be a school when the time came or that their kids would be allowed to attend. That didn't seem likely if things remained the way they were.

Sirius chuckled. "Oh, I dunno. Mary and Alex will share a handful of years with Teddy there. I'm sure they can play the part even without a proxy from Prongs's side around." He glanced once again at the baby's photo, trying to picture him ganging up with his two little terrors in a few years but something else caught his eye. He took a hold of the photo. "Didn't he have light hair just a second ago?" he asked, inspecting the photo closely, to make sure the black hair currently on the baby wasn't just some lighting thing.

"Oh – forgot to mention. He takes after his mother a lot," Remus stated, a proud grin on his face.

"Another metamorphagus?" Sirius asked in surprise. "Well, look at that. Maybe if you have half a dozen more, you can make up your own rainbow."

Remus' grin vanished immediately and he went a bit pale. "Merlin, don't even say that – Dora would kill you if she could hear you mentioning her having another one this early. She might kill me too for not killing you for saying it."

Sirius snorted. "What? Was it _that_ bad?"

"Worse. Horrifying. She threatened to kill me. Repeatedly."

His eyes narrowed a little. "Repeatedly as in saying a lot of times that she'd kill you or as in saying she'd kill you, than find a way to bring you back just so she could do it again?"

"_Both_. She was very graphic about it too, at times," Moony said, sounding a little traumatized.

His friend chuckled. "Well, I did predict she'd be a nightmare months ago, didn't I? What about hand-grasping? Anything Mia should take a look at? Possible broken bones?"

"Oh, no – that part actually wasn't that bad," Remus replied, showing him perfectly healthy hands without a hint of swelling or reddening. "One of the few occasions when being a werewolf is actually not that bad a thing."

Sirius glared. "Sometimes I hate you, you know? Mia nearly crushed my hand into mush! I swear it still acts up on a chilly day."

"I did no such thing!" Mia protested, sounding more than a little affronted as she approached them with their mugs of tea.

"Oh, no, it must have been the other pregnant wife whose hand I held for hours at a time through pain, sweat and blood," he replied. The nasty glare he received in return reminded him that maybe taking jabs at her pregnant self was probably not a very good strategy if he wanted to ever have kids with her again in the future. So, he tried to change the conversation by handing her back Teddy's photo. "Hey, look – kid's a metamorphagus."

It seemed to work that time as she was suddenly back to smiling at the picture of the now blue-haired child. "Aw. Two metamorphagi in the family – that's going to be interesting."

"Oh, Andromeda's already warned me of it. She says he's going to be a tricky one to handle – especially when we want to mingle with Muggles. But it will be worth it."

"Of course it will," Mia told him. "They give us a lot of sleepless nights, our little ones – not just in theses first few years, trust me – but it's all worth it when you watch them grow into honest, brave people. Which is of course what your Teddy will be. No chance he won't with you and Tonks raising him."

Speaking of brave people reminded Remus of something. "Merlin, I can't believe I've almost forgotten to tell you," he said. "I've just ran into Harry!"

"Harry?! How? Where?" Mia immediately wanted to know, a stunned look on her face.

Remus gave her a sad look. "You know he'd have told me not to tell you, Mia. He still thinks that the less you know, the better for you."

"But did you just run into him in the middle of the street or something?" Sirius asked, concerned. "We know he was staying at a friends' house – has he left it already?"

Remus shook his head. "He's perfectly safe and among friends where he is – that much I can tell you. I honestly wasn't expecting him to be there: I was just spreading the news about Teddy to some acquaintances. But please don't ask more questions about it – I don't want to break the first promise I made to Harry as my son's godfather less than an hour after I did it. Just trust that he's doing well. Ron and Hermione too, though she's still recovering from what happened at the Malfoy Manor. I asked if they had any plans to get back on the road soon, but Harry said they shouldn't be going anywhere until Hermione's back to one hundred per cent."

Both Sirius and Mia sighed in relief – that bought the kids a little more time in safety… and them some more restful nights. "Did you tell him about the Fidelius Charm?" Sirius asked.

"He already knew," Remus replied. "He thinks you did the right thing. I actually offered to set things up so the secret would reach him – have Dora write it down for him or something – since it seemed like something you'd want but he refused."

"Why?" Mia asked, frustrated. "That way he could find us if he needed to. And he wouldn't be able to tell it to anyone, in any case!"

"No," Remus agreed. "But if, Merlin forbid, something happened and Dora…" He didn't finish the implication but his friends nodded, indicating they knew what he was trying to say. "If the worst happened, he'd be turned into a secret-keeper too and he doesn't want to risk that happening." The new father sighed. "You've got to admit he's got a point: he's the most wanted man in the wizarding world. He's aware of the danger he's in and the danger he poses to those closest to him. It's not fair but it's true. It took me about ten minutes of convincing for him to accept being Teddy's godfather in the first place. He kept saying you were a better option," he said, nodding at Sirius.

"But he did accept in the end, right?" Mia asked.

"He did – I've got a feeling that the fact that Dora thought it would be 'cute' to make Ginny godmother along with him may have helped. We haven't been able to ask her yet but Harry didn't need to know that," Remus stated. "I doubt she'll refuse now that he's accepted it, anyway."

"You two sneaky little things trying to play cupid," Sirius commented with a chuckle. He had a feeling his friend had never really been fooled by Harry and Ginny's pretend break-up. "Here's a thing that's not so 'cute', though: I can't believe you started making your birth-announcement rounds over an hour ago and only showed up here now! What are we? Your last stop?"

"Last but not least, Padfoot," Remus assured him. "Really, it was just a matter of logistics."

"Logistics, he calls it," Sirius said dramatically. "What sort of logistics were those?"

"They were very centred around the fact that you have a history of being eager to get new fathers drunk – it seemed fitting that I'd make my rounds while sober."

Sirius gaped. "That happened _once," _he said.

"Oh, it certainly was worth three or four times more," Mia pointed out. "You had to call me over because James was acting all lethargic. It took two doses of sobering potion to get him back on his feet and an extra one for him to remember his wife had had a baby. Lily would have killed you if we hadn't covered it all up."

"It's not my fault the guy was a lightweight! Three butterbeers would get him tipsy. Besides, I only served him a glass!"

"A _self-filling_ glass," Remus pointed out.

"I didn't notice it was one of those – I was drunk too!" Sirius defended himself. "In any case, no booze for you today. There's not a drop of it in the house, anyway."

Remus raised his eyebrows. "How come? Don't tell me you drunk it all."

"Of course I did not drink it all," Sirius stated. "It just vanished. My guess is that Kreacher got rid of it all or hid it somewhere – he may have thought I might hit the bottle during all those months without Mia around. My father did have a special fondness for it… Never mind that if I really wanted it, I could have ordered him to get it back. Didn't feel like it, though. I suppose it would come handy for a toast now, though…"

"Well, there's the tea," Mia suggested. "You can always celebrate it in style another time."

Sirius nodded. "I guess. Wouldn't want to get into Tonks's bad side by sending her back a drunk husband or a splinched one for that matter. She sounds pretty murderous at the moment, that one. Plus, she needs you whole to change the diapers."

"Yes, because that's all I'm for anymore," Remus mumbled sarcastically.

"Oh, trust me – that how you're going to feel like in a couple of weeks," Sirius assured him with a knowing chuckle, which Mia agreed with through a nod. "Now, who should we toast to, then? Young Teddy Lupin?"

"Teddy and Dora. She did put herself through a lot of trouble to get him here," Remus offered.

"Alright, then," Sirius raised his mug of tea, Mia and Remus flowing shortly. "To the newest marauder Teddy Lupin… and to the mother of my future godchild."

Remus let out a long-suffering groan – with Teddy as a known precedent, there would be no shutting Sirius up now when it came to 'his duty of enlarging the Marauder family'. "Cheers," he simply replied, hopelessly joyful, regardless.

**A/N: And so Teddy is born. He may make an appearance next chapter - I'm still pondering it right now.** **Feedback is ever so welcome. Review!**


	62. The Longest Night

**A/N: Apologies in advance if you find this chapter is a bit disjoint - it essentially covers two very distinct moments of the story, the later one being... well, you'll see pretty clearly what it is. If my count is right, only a couple more chapters and an epilogue until this volume is over - then, it's time for the sequel, which I count on making smaller than this fic.**

**On other news, I keep apologizing for my delays - this time, I blame it on the massive funk I got myself into when I realized the theme I had in mind for my master's dissertation sucked. It took three weeks of self-pity and researching but now I have another one. I still wonder what possessed me to think getting an MBA on Business Management coming from an anthropology background was a good idea in the first place... **

**Anyway, good reading and a Happy belated Thanksgiving for those who celebrate it!**

Teddy Lupin was a little over three weeks old when the Blacks finally got to meet him.

Although Remus managed to find the time to visit his friends often after his son's birth, proudly boasting the newborn's achievements and tiredly sharing the well-known stress of being a new parent – doing so while looking happier than he'd ever seemed –, the baby never actually came along or left home, for that matter. Sirius and Mia didn't blame him or Tonks – Merlin knew they wouldn't let their little ones out of the house even if they hadn't bounties on their heads. Not when people were snatched and murdered on the streets of London every other day.

But, as full-moon approached and Remus started despairing at the prospect that his son might have possibly inherited his 'problem', Teddy having to leave the safety of home in order to meet the Blacks became inevitable: Remus didn't want want his wife alone with the baby in case his fears turned out to be real and there was no one he trusted more to look after his son if that were the case than the best friend who'd been dealing with him during full-moon since they were in school.

So, as evening approached in the much-dreaded day, the doorbell of the house eventually rang, announcing the arrival of a clearly exhausted Tonks, balancing a portable bassinet on one arm and a bunch of bags on the other.

"Merlin, are you planning to sleep over or permanently move in here?" Sirius asked the moment he laid eyes on the new mother.

The metamorphagus gave him an exasperated look. "Teddy's never been out of home before. I don't know what he'll need – he's a demanding little thing, you know?"

"Don't mind him – he seems to forget very easily how clueless he was when we took Alex out for the first time and we were just going to the park then, mind you," Mia said, slapping her husband on the arm. "Now, let us see that demanding little thing of yours while Sirius gets the bags upstairs."

"Hey, I want to see the little bugger too!" Sirius protested.

"Hurry putting the bags away, then," his wife replied in a practical fashion.

He protested a little more under his breath but that didn't stop him from taking most of Tonks's load, all except from the portable bassinet.

As her husband made his way upstairs, Mia peeked into it, finding it occupied with the sleeping little Lupin. He was a tiny little thing, not that much bigger than the last picture Remus had shown them, all rosy cheeks and colourful hair – that day, it was bright red, having apparently been inspired by the blanket he was wrapped on, which was exactly the same shade of red. Even as Mia reached in, softly caressing one of the baby's little hands, Teddy didn't as much as move a muscle, so deeply he was sleeping. "You're a peaceful little thing, aren't you?" Mia whispered to the boy with a smile.

Tonks snorted the moment she heard that, actually shaking with laughter that the baby seemed completely oblivious to in his sleep. "_P__eaceful_?" she asked. "Merlin, that's just hilarious… You should have heard him a few hours ago – 'peaceful' would be the farthest word from your mind if you'd been anywhere near him then."

"A good pair of lungs, I take it," Mia guessed.

"A great one," Tonks pointed out. "I mean, I love this little bugger to death but he does _not_ like going to sleep when we want him to." She peaked into the bassinet, sighing at the sight of the sleeping boy. "On the other hand, when he's really down, it takes nothing short of an earthquake to wake him for at least three or four hours. Still, I'm a bit impressed that he managed to sleep through me apparating here."

Mia looked up from the baby and frowned at the new mother. "I can't believe you apparated here with all that on you. Not to mention more than a few sleepless nights on your back," she said. "Merlin, you could have splinched yourself, Tonks!"

Tonks rolled her eyes. "Now you're starting to sound like my mother."

"Good – that's the tone I was aiming for."

"Well, then I'll tell you what I'd tell her: I'm an auror. I was trained to apparate in the worst conditions without splinching myself. Worse – I got trained by Mad-Eye, who was completely mad. He did everything from making me apparate while juggling stuff to getting me out of bed with the flu and make me do it while I was running a fever of 40 degrees. It didn't go very well at first but it sure worked out in the end. I know what I'm doing."

Mia sighed. "Well, fine, but at least next time send a warning ahead so we can send Kreacher to get the heaviest things. You look exhausted."

Tonks took a breath that matched Mia's assessment just right. "It's the most frustrating thing, you know? I chased bad guys for a living, sometimes for weeks in a row with little sleep in between. I lived through physical auror training, which is known to be able to bring grown men to tears. And, still, despite all of that, this little guy has me running more raged than all of those things. Talk about small packaging for big trouble."

"I'd love to tell you it's all about reverse proportion but I can't – just wait until he's a little bigger and able to crawl away when you take your eyes off him for a second. And when the accidental magic starts kicking in… well, you'll be thankful at least they usually sleep through the night then," Mia warned her. "But in the meanwhile, since he can't move on his own yet, let me carry that bassinet up for you – I imagine your back could use a rest right about now."

"Wise words," Tonks said, handing the bassinet over to her friend.

Before any of them had a chance to head to the stairs, though, their attention was caught by the sound of someone shouting something similar to 'Auntie Tonks' from the nearby room that held the library, followed by the patting of little feet on the floor that preceded the arrival of a dark-haired blur motioning towards Tonks – a blur, of course, named Alex and seemingly more-than-eager to wrap himself around his godfather's wife's legs (with such eagerness that he nearly threw her off balance).

"Alex! Don't go around nearly tackling people!" Izzy scolded her brother, apologetically hurrying after him out of the library. "Sorry, I tried to keep him away so you'd have the time to get the baby to safety but he got out of the blanket fort and heard your voice and, well, you can figure the rest… Did we wake him up?"

Tonks glanced at her still-sleeping son in his portable bassinet and shook her head. "He's fine. At this point, I'm pretty sure it would take an army of Alexes to wake him. I've got to say, if the kid didn't react so badly to my attempts at singing him to sleep, I might just wonder if he was deaf," she mumbled, just before another shout came from the library – that time from Mary and clearly out of outrage at being left behind rather than enthusiasm like it had been her brother's case. The words were still hard to decipher but Izzy clearly recognized them as her name as she hurried back into the room, cursing under her breath.

"Where'd the baby go?" Alex asked his borrowed aunt, staring at her surprisingly flatter midriff, likely too young to remember how things had worked out when his mother had been the one having a baby in the previous year.

"He's right over there," Tonks said, pointing at the bassinet. "Do you want to see him?"

"He's a boy?" the young man asked, completely missing the hint given by the use of the 'he' rather than 'she'.

"Yep."

Alex shrugged. "D'you wanna trade'im for Mary?" he offered after a few seconds of observing the sleeping baby and deeming him interesting enough once Teddy changed his hair to blue in his sleep.

"Alex!" Mia light-heartedly scolded her son as Tonks just snorted at the proposal, having not been the first time she'd heard it. "Why would you want to trade your sister for another baby?"

"Girls 're icky," he responded like it was obvious.

Mia sighed – so it was that phase. "Honey, I'm a girl and so is Izzy. And your auntie Tonks too. And grandma Lulu. Are we icky?"

She might as well have said there was no such thing as Santa Claus – apparently Alex didn't seem to have put it together that 'big ladies' were technically girls too. And, by the look on his face, he didn't appear willing to believe it now either. "'re not girls!" the little boy shouted, in complete denial, clutching to one of Izzy's legs the moment she stepped back into the entrance hall with Mary in her arms. "No!"

"No what?" Izzy asked, looking confused as her mother shook her head, telling her to just drop the subject – the clock was ticking and that would have to be a conversation for another time.

She put her sister down and let her toddle towards Tonks, who didn't hesitate on picking her up and letting her place the usual slobbery kiss on her face, even though she clearly grimaced at the toddler's weight. "Alright, now, what did I hear about a blanker fort? I used to love making those," Tonks said, using the excuse of clutching down to Alex's level to place Mary back down on the floor.

The mention of the blanket fort seemed to work on deflecting the little boy's thoughts from the 'girl conundrum'. "We're campin'," Alex proudly announced, his face all smiles.

Tonks raised her eyebrows. "Camping?" she asked, unsure his notion of 'camping' was the same as hers. "In a blanket fort?"

The boy nodded enthusiastically before pointing at the door he'd come from. "'t's in the libwy. 't's big," the little boy proudly announced.

"Biiiii," Mary repeated with a giggle, having toddled over to her mother and started pulling on her leg to get her attention – having placed the bassinet down for Alex to see the baby, Mia took a moment to reach down and press a kiss against the top of her youngest child's head, keeping an eye on her once Mary turned her attention to the baby, eyeing him curiously before she started making faces.

"You can camp too if you want. There's space," Alex offered.

Tonks chuckled. "That's a very tempting offer, Alex, but I'll have to skip this time," she told the little boy, ruffling his hair affectionately.

"_Oi, what's taking you two so long?_" they heard Sirius asking before spotting him coming down the stairs. "I thought I was the one who needed to hurry after you."

"We're going – we just stopped so Tonks could say hello to our little campers," Mia told her husband.

"Well, take your time, then, because in the meanwhile Mr Teddy here and I," he said, taking the bassinet from Mia, "are going to have a bloke-to-bloke chat upstairs. And I won't apologize for any corruption that takes place while you ladies stay behind." He stopped before heading to the stairs to tickle little Mary's neck until she escaped, giggling, to hide behind her mother's back and to ruffle his son's already messy hair. "Keep an eye on your sisters tonight, mate."

"Oh, good – trust the hyperactive three-year old over the nearly-off-age daughter to keep things calm tonight," Izzy said sarcastically as her father chuckled all the way upstairs, already sharing philosophical thoughts with a thankfully sleeping Teddy.

"Well, have a good time tonight in your blanket fort," Tonks said, kneeling down to embrace both Alex and Mary, who was quick to join from behind her mother's back, before getting up and doing the same to Izzy. "I promise I'll try and join you one of these days now that I have Teddy for an excuse to do all those things I loved as a kid all over again."

"We'll be waiting," Izzy said as the metamorphagus took a step back. "Hey, one thing, though – you haven't heard any word from the Weasleys lately or anything, have you?"

Tonks shook her head. "Not directly. Remus did tell me a few weeks ago that he was with Bill and that he said everyone was okay. He and Fleur are not staying with the others, though. But they were safe – I'm sure we would have heard if that had changed. Can't tell you more than that, though. But I could ask Remus to pass a message along when he sees Bill again, if you want. Anything you want to say to them?"

_George, get your arse in here so we can make this official, _she thought, knowing there was no way she was going to say it out loud to be passed along by who-knew-how-many-people before possibly reaching the intended target. "Just that I can't wait for the next time I see them," she said, hoping George in particular would get the message. "It's getting boring in here."

Tonks nodded. "So noted… I'll get the message on the move as soon as I can." She checked her watch and did the math to figure out how many minutes they had before moon rise. "Alright, I'd better head upstairs before your father somehow manages to scar my baby for life in his sleep," she said, trying to sound far more upbeat than she felt before heading to the stairs.

Mia stayed behind for a moment as the pink-haired woman climbed up to the first floor, waiting to have a last word with Izzy out of her earshot. "Okay, do you remember what we told you?"

Izzy huffed. "Yes: don't tear my eyes away from Alex and Mary; don't go upstairs no matter what I hear; send Kreacher up in case it gets really bad and cast an imperturbable charm in the room so Alex and Mary won't get scared."

"And don't let Alex take your wand," Mia added. "We don't want another incident like last week's – I still haven't figured out how he got the dinning room's furniture to stick to the ceiling or how to get it down from there."

"Got it," Izzy assured her. "We'll be fine down here, Mum. Just… be careful up there. It's not that I hate babysitting them," she said, nodding at Alex, who happened to be showing Mary how to climb up a chair and failing at it, for the little girl's amusement, "but I don't want this to become standard full-moon practice."

"It won't," Mia promised, before bidding goodnight to her children and making her way up the stairs.

In the living room, she found Tonks leaning back against the sofa, probably enjoying the quietest moments she'd had in a long time, struggling to pay attention to Sirius as he walked around the room with her sleeping newborn son in his arms.

"…honestly, with this metamorphagus thing, if he's even half the troublemaker we were in school, he's going to be the bane of McGonagall's existence," Sirius proudly attested. "Get him together with Alex and she'll be pulling at her own hair."

"Will you stop rooting for those prime-prankster Black genes to kick in?" Tonks said, sighing as Mia came into the room. "Honestly, I could use a full night of sleep anytime before he's all grown up and over the prankster thing."

"You should know no one's ever really over the 'prankster thing'. And, by the way, 'Black genes'? You think it's the _Black _genes you have to worry about? Oh, no, those Lupin genes can give you a run for your money. That detail-oriented brain of Moony's: he could turn the sloppiest prank prompt Prongs and I came up with into a work of art. Wrap it with a bow and hand it over in a flawless platter. Your husband was no saint, Tonksie. He was – _is_ – just as much of a Marauder as James and I were. He's just better at making himself look innocent."

"Not to mention that he does have something called 'a notion of what is and isn't appropriate at certain times' and an inkling of self-control, which you and James often lacked," Mia pointed out.

"Don't listen to her, Teddy," Sirius told the little boy. "Auntie Mia may say all she likes but one of the reasons why she fell for Uncle Padfoot was him being so wild and spontaneous, not to mention ruggedly handsome."

"Auntie Mia would like a chance to hold young Mr. Lupin before Uncle Padfoot corrupts him for good," Mia replied, walking over to her husband.

"Uncle Padfoot will concede, but only because he just happens to find Auntie Mia very attractive when she's holding a baby," he agreed, handing the boy over to his wife.

"Ew!" Tonks said from her seat. "Don't use my son as a prop for your twisted flirting. You're grand-godparents – act as such."

"Grand-godparents?!" Sirius asked in an alarmed tone as he stared at the baby. "Grand-godparents…"

"Well, Harry's his godfather, you're Harry's godparents who just happened to raise him, thus: grand-godparents," Tonks explained.

"Merlin," Sirius mumbled. "We're old," he whispered.

"We're thirty-eight – that hardly makes us old," Mia told him, not looking up from the sleeping baby, whose hair had just turned into some sort of violet shade.

"But the prefix 'grand'… it just sounds so old," he mumbled.

Mia sighed, finally turning to Tonks. "Can we just stick to being Teddy's borrowed uncle and aunt? Else I think Sirius may just have a slight bout of neurosis."

"You can be whatever you want to him – if it wasn't for you steering Remus back in my direction every time he pulled away, I'm not sure if Teddy would exist at all."

"Oh, I'm sure he would," Mia told her, smiling down at the boy. "Fate has a way of working things out in the end, especially if they lead to precious little things like this one."

"Besides, Remus had it bad – still does, honestly," Sirius pointed out. "And the bloke can be stoic like nothing I've ever seen before, but he's still human. That self-control of his isn't made of steel. And speaking of self-control and, by extension, unintentional lack of thereof, how was Moony doing when you left? Think this is going to be a bad full-moon?"

"Well, it's never a good one, but I've seen him worse. Physically, he wasn't too bad: he took the Wolfsbane in time, even let me feed him a few pepper-up potions. I think he did it so he could hang around taking care of Teddy even today… which brings me to the other part…"

"He's anxious about Teddy's first full-moon," Mia easily guessed, reaching to place him back in the portable bassinet on the sofa before taking a seat by it.

Tonks nodded. "I told him he was being silly – warewolves are made, not born, and even if they were, there was never any sign when I was pregnant." Which brought her to the point when she had wonder why she needed to make such a massive effort to keep a brave face and not to freak out, if that was actually what she was so certain of… "Teddy will be fine," she said, more to convince herself than she was willing to admit.

"Of course he will," Sirius agreed. "That's what we're here for. We'll look after him whatever happens tonight… probably nothing worse than a pile of dirty nappies."

She had to chuckle a little. "I haven't thanked you for doing this yet," she said. "Letting me and Teddy come here tonight when there's a chance – even if small – he might…"

"Hey, none of that! That's what friends are for," Sirius assured her. "Besides, I know how to handle werewolves and if it's the kids you're worried about, they're perfectly safe."

Mia nodded. "Kreacher's under orders to apparate them all out of this house if he hears any suspicious commotion up here." A detail of the plan, they had conveniently left out of their daughter's briefing, considering that adventurous little streak of hers might just make her want to stay and help out rather than be taken away to safety. "As far as the little ones are concerned, tonight's a fun night camping in the library with their big sister."

"And babysitting is good for Izzy – seems to be the one thing in this house that keeps her entertained enough to stop being holed up in her bedroom or walking around the place in her jim-jams," Sirius commented.

"Why wouldn't she? They're so comfortable. And it's not like she's going anywhere anytime soon," Tonks pointed out. "Best thing about having a baby is that you have a perfect excuse to wear pyjamas all day… well, one of the best at least."

Sirius huffed. "You know what? I'm not even going to bother with you.," he mumbled. "Anyway, how's your Mum? Moony mentioned she's been around a lot."

"She's doing better," Tonks said, her lips curling a little. "It seems having a Ted in her life makes it infinitely better for her – now she's got another one, even though he's tiny and loud. She wanted to come along today. It took ages to convince her I'd be fine without her here."

"Look, if it bothers you a lot having to hide our location from her, you can just tell her," Sirius offered. "There are worse people in the world who could know."

"Two of them being my aunts," Tonks mumbled. "Anyway, it's _your_ secret – I'm just keeping it for you, so I'm not breathing a word unless you tell me to. And she can live without knowing. I know that and so does she. But she did say you'd better get visiting more often once this whole thing is over. When was the last time you've seen her, anyway? My birthday?"

"Yeah," Sirius mumbled.

"The one from two years ago," Mia added, narrowing her eyes at her husband.

"What? She didn't ask which birthday! And it's not like Andromeda comes here often either – I'm not the worst cousin in the world."

"Well, that's not particularly hard, considering the rest of the family is either legally insane or currently planning on killing you next time they lay eyes on you," Tonks pointed out.

"Thank you!" he said, glad she matched his thoughts. "Someone finally puts things into the right perspective."

Before any of them could say anything else, though, Kreacher apparated into the room with the usual 'pop'. Mia immediately turned to him like she'd been expecting it.

"Is it time?" she asked the house-elf.

Kreacher nodded. "Fifteen minutes, Mistress."

"Thank you, Kreacher. You can go back to what you were doing," she told him.

The house-elf gave another nod and then proceeded to vanish again.

"I asked Kreacher to give us a little warning before moonrise," Mia explained before any of them could ask. "Maybe we should move to the room. We can talk in there."

Tonks nodded. "Yeah," she agreed before turning to the sleeping little boy next to her. "Time to prove your daddy wrong," she told the baby, mentally begging him not to let her down on that one.

They guided her to the only guest bedroom on the same floor, where she'd stayed before a couple of times, one when Remus had left, the other during the previous full-moon. Unlike those times, though, the cradle that had once belonged to Alex and then Mary was set up next to the bed.

"We thought he'd be more comfortable in there," Mia explained when she saw Tonks looking at it.

The metamorphagus gave her a nod before placing the portable bassinet on the bed and lifting her sleeping son from it. She didn't move him to the cradle immediately, though – she just cradled him against her chest for a moment while she paced inside the room. "So, how is this going to work?"

Sirius sighed. "Well, for starters, you put him down in the cradle like normal. Then I'll cast a barrier charm over it – it will be like there's a wall on top of it but you'll still be able to see him. Remus reckons it will be enough to contain him since he's still so little and you've given him a few drops of wolfsbane potion, haven't you?"

Tonks nodded, placing a little kiss against the baby's now blue-green hair. "Elizabeth said she didn't think it would harm him even if he's not… you know." She looked at Mia for confirmation.

"It usually has no ill effect on non-werewolves – a little drowsiness, maybe. And, as long as you adapt the dose to the weight, any werewolf could take it, regardless of age," she assured the woman. "Besides, if it had to hurt him, you'd already know."

The new mother took a breath, rubbing a hand against the baby's back. "And then we just wait," she guessed.

"It's really all we can do," Sirius pointed out. "You can hold on to him for a couple more minutes but then you really should put him down. The moon rise calculations are not always 100% accurate. And neither are clocks. It's good to keep at least a good five minute margin."

Tonks clearly took that statement to the letter, as she used up every second holding her son up until the five-minute margin. Afterwards, she sat down on the edge of the bed next to Mia, looking at her little boy lying in the cradle as Sirius cast the barrier charm over it. She wasn't sure if he'd somehow felt the charm or if it was just a coincidence, but the moment Sirius uttered the spell, Teddy started blinking his eyes awake.

"There he is," she said, getting back up and leaning over the cradle in order to get a better look at the little boy as he started moving his arms and legs everywhere. She instinctively moved her hand to reach into the cradle but instead her hand hit the glass-like barrier. She immediately retreated her hand, resting it on the edge of the cradle instead.

"He's a curious little bugger, hum?" Sirius said as he watched his best friend's son's eyes move everywhere, taking in every face and every detail of his unfamiliar surroundings. He looked as if he was deliberating on whether he liked them or not.

"He always watches things – when he's not in a mood, that is," Tonks said as Mia joined them at looking at the baby. "The first time he put him in his cot, he spent a good ten minutes examining the mobile over it. Then, he decided he didn't like it and started to cry. Later, turned out it was just too low and it scared him. He's fine with it now."

He seemed to be doing the very same thing to the two strangers standing over the cradle along with his mum: assessing them in a wide-eyed fashion until he reached a decision. It wasn't a positive one – the whimpering certainly gave it away.

"Oh," Tonks mumbled, once again forgetting about the barrier and hitting it with her hand as she instinctively tried to reach in so she could soothe her son before the whimpering turned into full-blown crying. She looked up at Sirius, a pleading look in her eyes. "Do you think you can…?"

He gave her a sad look. "It's probably not the best idea, Tonks. We'll be cutting it close."

She wanted to protest – part of her actually needed to. Standing by and not doing a thing while she heard her little boy crying was against every instinct she had.

"He's probably just upset at having a couple of strangers staring down at him. He'll be fine," Mia told her as she stepped back to sit back on the bed and signalled at Sirius to move away from the cot too, which he did by walking over to the window.

But it didn't work. Instead of calming down, the boy actually grew more restless, crying as loudly as his little lungs would allow him. As she stated at his little red face, Tonks could practically hear him saying it: '_Why won't you pick me up, woman? What kind of mother are you?' _She looked at Sirius again – she knew she shouldn't ask but she just couldn't help it. "Sirius, please…"

"Just hold on a few more minutes until we know if it's going to happen or not," her cousin told her firmly. "Wailing won't kill him but picking him might just kill _you_."

She slumped back down onto the edge of the bed, sitting there unable to look at her son crying. She placed her arms on the edge of the cradle, over the barrier, and the rested her head down against them, staring at the floor, as the sound broke her heart over and over again.

She couldn't help wondering all the wrong things. Could the crying be a sign? Could he already be transforming and responding to the pain by helplessly wailing? She couldn't look to check – she just couldn't bring herself to do it. So she didn't move, forcing herself to listen to his wailing as some sort of penance.

It felt like hours in her mind. She only vaguely registered Mia placing her hand on her shoulder and telling her everything was going to be fine even though she had no idea if it would.

At some point, her friends' voices became clearer and she felt herself being shaken back from the tortuous world of guilt she'd withdrawn herself into.

"Tonks? Tonks," she heard Sirius calling over her son's cries.

The metamorphagus looked up at him, appearing like the most miserable person on Earth.

"Sirius disabled the spell – you can get him," Mia told her.

"What?"

"He's fine," Sirius said. "The moon has been up for nearly ten minutes. If he had to turn, he'd have already turned."

She just looked at him for a few seconds, so relieved she could barely believe it. "He's okay?" she asked.

Mia nodded. "Your baby is a perfectly normal, very special little boy."

"Oh," she mumbled. "Oh, thank Merlin." And, without any more hesitation, she reached into the bassinet, picking up her wailing little son and holding his little body firmly against hers. She placed a kiss on the top of his dark blonde little head – his hair always seemed to turn to its original colour when he was upset –, mumbling little nothings in hope to calm him down. Teddy didn't seem set on making it easy, though, eagerly showing his lung prowess as his little hands gripped his mother's shirt. For once, the wailing didn't make Tonks wish she was deaf – she was far too relieved by the fact that she could hold her baby through it.

As Sirius and Mia watched the scene, they quickly realized the woman could probably use a few moments alone with her son. "We'll be out in the living room if you need us, okay?" Mia told her.

Tonks absently nodded as she started walking around the room with the little boy, trying to soothe him.

"Well, that was awful," Sirius stated as he closed the door behind them seconds later. "I felt like a villain in there."

"You did what you had to do," Mia told him. "You did what Remus expected you to do. She'll be fine and so will the baby."

"Bloody relief the kid didn't turn," he said with a long breath. "I'm not sure how Remus would have taken it if the kid had a furry little problem too. I know we talked about this and we told him it would be fine either way but let's be honest: it would have killed him."

"He'd have been riddled with guilt, yes," Mia agreed. "But now he won't have to be." She sighed, lacing her arm with his as they walked back into the living room. "Just serves to show that good things can happen even these days when everything's so bleak." She looked up at him. "Hey, I need to ask you something."

"Ask away, Mrs Black."

"Do you think you could handle a potentially sleepless night tonight?"

Sirius raised his eyebrows. "Love, you know I can always handle a sleepless night when you're the one asking for it," he assured her with a grin.

She rolled her eyes as she took a seat on the sofa. "Not for _that_! And don't even pretend _that _wasn't what you were thinking about. We have a guest over! A tired new mother, a little bit overwhelmed with her new baby… which brings me to the real reason for the sleepless night I was talking about."

"You're thinking it wouldn't hurt for us to offer to play overnights babysitters so she can get some sleep," he guessed, since her reasoning was becoming painfully obvious.

"Yes. Alex and Mary already sleep through the night and Izzy's got them until the morning, anyway…"

"Hey, you don't need to convince me," he told her. "A chance to teach the kid all the Marauder wisdom without his mum breathing down my neck? I'm there. Not sure she'll go for it, though. Tonks may be exhausted but with all the drama she had to go through with him tonight, I'm not sure if she'll want to be apart from him."

"Well, like you said, it doesn't hurt to offer," she pointed out.

But, as a good half-hour passed and there was no sign of the new mother ever intending to leave the room, they started to think they might not get a chance. Maybe ever.

"Do you think Teddy's still crying?" Mia wondered out loud.

"It doesn't sound like it," her husband replied – it had been a while since the wailing had subsided in the bedroom.

"Might be because she charmed the door soundproof – we did it all the time when Alex or Mary were throwing massive fits, remember?" Suddenly, recalling the extent of the abilities of a soundproof charm, Mia's eyes widened. "You don't think… you don't think Teddy could've… you know… _turned_. After we left, I mean. What if it took longer because he's a baby or…"

"I don't think so, Mia. The most I've seen it delaying for Remus was two or three minutes. We gave Teddy ten," he said. And, although logically he felt like he was right, the very idea crossing Mia's mind – and now his as well – made him nervous. "I guess we could check, though, if it would ease your mind."

Mia nodded, getting to her feet. "I think we really should."

They walked in silence towards the room, from where no discernible sound came through the door.

"Tonks?" she called, knocking softly. There was no response. She looked at Sirius and raised her eyebrows in alarm. "Tonks?" she called again, getting – once more – no response.

At that, Sirius started to reach for the doorknob, only to have his hand slapped away by his wife. "What?" he asked.

"Let me go in first," she said.

"There's no way…"

"Sirius, what if nothing's actually wrong and she's in some sort of compromising position? You know, changing or nursing or… never mind. Do you really want to walk in on your cousin in any of those situations?"

His face clearly said 'no'. That would be awkward at the very least. "Fine. But if I hear any odd sound from inside…"

"You're blasting past me like a knight in shining armour," Mia guessed. "As if I don't know you well enough. Now shoo."

So, as his wife turned the doorknob, Sirius stayed just a step behind, his hand on the path to the wand in his pocket. But, as she pushed the door open just a small crack and no suspicious sound came from within, he found himself relaxing even as Mia poked her head in. When she pulled back and looked at him with a smile on her face, he found himself just a little stupid for having doubted his previous judgement. Everything was clearly fine.

"I don't think we'll get much of a fight from her in what comes to us babysitting," she said, turning off the lights on the hallway before pushing the door open just a little more.

Even from the hallway, he managed to spot a streetlight-illuminated Tonks laying face-down on the bed, clearly asleep even though she was still fully dressed. If he had to take a guess, he'd say that taking a nap had been the least of her plans when she'd lain down. She appeared as if she'd been trying to lull her son, who just happened to be lying on his back by her side, back to sleep, although the intended roles had clearly reversed – she seemed so down under that, even while protectively resting her hand on the boy's belly, his flailing limbs and faint whimpers wouldn't even make her stir.

"I get the baby, you get his things," Mia said before stepping into the room.

Ten minutes later, Mia had successfully gotten hold of the baby, placed a blanket over the new mother and closed the curtains of the room and he'd managed to not only carry two bags full of baby stuff but also his kids' old bassinet – all that without Tonks moving an inch. Once he'd accidentally stubbed his foot against the door, making quite a bit of noise that still didn't wake her, he found it necessary to shove his two-way mirror under her face to make sure she was still breathing – she was. It had been a while since he'd seen someone exhaust themselves into such a deep stupor – last one being her husband after a particularly gruelling full-moon. Therefore, he'd say there was little chance she'd wake before noon the following day unless someone made her.

"I can see where Teddy gets his sleeping patterns from," Mia observed, looking down at Teddy as Sirius shared his observations with her. The boy seemed content enough for the moment, grasping at Mia's hair like he'd never done so before. Then again, Tonks rarely wore it long, so he might have not. "We should probably write her a note, though, shouldn't we? If she wakes up and doesn't know where Teddy is, she might panic. I would."

"I already did," her husband stated.

"What did it say?"

"The obvious. _We have the kid._ What else is there to say?"

"Honestly! That sounds like a ransom note, Sirius!" she said.

Sirius frowned. "How is that a ransom note? I didn't ask for a ransom anywhere in it," he replied.

"A kidnap note, then," she amended, getting up. "Here," she said, handling the baby over to him, "watch him while I go write her something less horrifying."

"Horrifying?!" he asked in disbelief as she walked out. He looked down at the newborn in his arms. "You know what, kid, now's a time as good as any to start teaching you bits of wisdom. Lesson number one: ladies are mental. You can't live without them but never let'em fool you: ladies and mental are synonyms all the way."

Outside the room, hearing her husband's room, Mia sighed. That was going to be a long night.

**2 May 1998**

It was two in the morning and Izzy Black was standing in her house's kitchen, far from asleep. She knew she should be, but she also knew that if she didn't use the godforsaken late hours of night to train her portkey-making skills, she would never get the chance to do so. Why? Because, during the day, her parents were _everywhere_. She could hardly spend fifteen minutes outsider of her room without running into one of them and since it was just pointless to test her portkeys within the limited square feet of her bedroom, nightime, while they were asleep, would have to do. It was much easier to pretend she'd all of a sudden developed a knack for sleeping late than answering a thousand questions as to what she was making Portkeys for.

She wasn't doing anything wrong, she kept telling herself. She was just refining her contingency plans by practicing an exit – of course, such contingency plans might just rub her parents the wrong way so, to avoid a direct 'no', she kept them to herself.

So far, it was going surprisingly well – she might be dreadful at apparating but portkeys seemed to agree with her… which made her groan because, under normal circumstances, they might just get her arrested. Still, she made herself ignore it – weren't there far more important things to worry about during a war? It wasn't like she wasn't a fugitive already, anyway. Better go on practicing, then.

The ideal would be, of course, to test those portkeys by travelling through distances of miles rather than the yards doing it inside the house allowed, but the wards wouldn't allow her to go beyond those walls unless they were created by the owner of the house, who would be her dad and not her.

She was just starting to look around for some useless item to turn into her next portkey when she heard it: the front door opening and closing upstairs. The sound alone made her freeze, mostly for the fact that neither she nor her parents could have gone out and, outside of them, very little people could just burst in without as much as ringing the doorbell. And never for a good reason at that ungodly hour.

She moved carefully to the stairs and barely had the time to wonder who it was when she recognized the voice calling for Kreacher and asking him to get his masters downstairs – it was her grandfather, very unusual anxious tone only confirmed her fears – he'd come for no good reason. And she had a feeling such no-good-reason was not for her ears, which was too bad for Gabe and her parents because she wasn't planning to go anywhere to give them their privacy – if there was one thing she knew about that house, was that from that stairwell leading to the basement kitchen, she could hear every word said in the entrance hall, provided no one looked down to find her there. She could only hope they wouldn't move elsewhere in the meanwhile.

"_What's wrong?" _her mother's startled voice reached her ears, following the sound of footsteps. "_Is it Lulu? Oh, Merlin, don't tell me…_"

"_Your mother is fine. This isn't about her. It's Harry_," Gabe told her.

Izzy felt her heart racing at the mention of his name. Immediately, her mind was filled with all the worst scenarios.

"_What about him?_" her father's voice inquired.

"_He's at Hogwarts. Aberforth got through to Kingsley, who got through to me. Something big is happening in Hogwarts and Harry's right in the middle of it. I thought you'd want to know we're heading there to lend him a hand in whatever he's working on_," Gabe told them.

"You're _going there? No. _We_'re going there,_" Sirius corrected his father-in-law.

"_Sirius is right, Gabe. If something big is happening, we need to be there for him,_" her mother was quick to agree.

There was a moment of silence after that.

"_Well, I can't say I didn't see this one coming_," Gabe offered. "_And I suppose I have no authority to stop you since I'd do just the same if it were you out there. Just don't make me regret it_."

"_I don't count on it_," she promised.

"_How do we get in, though?"_ Sirius asked. "_He's at Hogwarts, not the shop around the corner. It probably won't have the gates open, just waiting for us to swoop in. And the secret passages to Hogsmeade are all blocked._"

"_Kingsley said to head to the_ Hog's Head. _Abe seems to have some sort of trick up his sleeve in there to get in. I'll meet you there with Lucy – she went off to spread the word to a few more acquaintances._"

"_This could be it, right?_" her mother's shaky voice said. "_If Snape and the Carrows know Harry's at Hogwarts, they'll call their master and, as long as he and Harry are in the same place at the same time…_"

That thought was as terrifying as it was exciting. In one hand, they could be headed to the confrontation between Harry and Voldemort they'd been dreading for years and could lead to the death of either of them. On the other hand, prophecy said such a confrontation was unavoidable, no matter how much they ran, so might as well get it over with. Because they could win. It could all be over that day. They could be free. And that was the outcome she chose to focus on, because them losing that night was just something she wasn't willing to entertain in her mind and nothing actually happening – either because Harry being at Hogwarts was nothing more than a rumour or he'd left before Voldemort arrived or they, once again, were just unable to put an end to it – just didn't occur to her.

It was the front door opening and shutting again that woke her up from her thoughts. Gabe had been the only one to leave, she quickly concluded, upon hearing her parent's voices upstairs growing more and more distant.

"…_hurry getting dressed. Still need to check on the kids…_" she vaguely heard her mother's voice saying upstairs.

"Oh crap," she whispered to herself, recalling she wasn't supposed to be out of bed. She needed to get upstairs and pretend to be asleep. If she didn't, things would just get too complicated – they'd tell her to stay, she'd tell them she'd go, they'd say no and she'd fight some more. In the end, they'd probably find a way to keep her from leaving, either it was by guilting her into it or by physically trying her to the furniture or something. The easy thing to do was pretending to sleep, hoping they wouldn't wake her, and not let them breach the subject. That way, she'd at least have the excuse that they hadn't specifically forbidden her to go, although there was no denying it was more than implied.

She climbed up the stairs as silently as humanely possible, hoping they wouldn't catch her on the act. Upon reaching the first floor, she heard them moving upstairs, outside of their room, probably already taking their rounds with Alex and Mary – she couldn't risk getting to her room, so she changed the strategy. She went to the living room.

The door was closed when she got there, which thankfully served her purpose. She opened it and stepped in, closing it back behind her. Then, she lay down on the sofa, pulling a blanket someone had left there sometime before over her – thank Merlin it was there, she thought, or else they'd see she wasn't in her pyjamas, always changing out of them during the Patronus-testing sessions, in case she made a mess out of herself or ripped them, creating proof she hadn't exactly been sleeping all night – and used the remote to turn the telly on. Hopefully, her parents would buy it that she'd fallen asleep watching the telly and leave it alone.

As she lay there, waiting for them to come looking for her, Izzy couldn't help thinking that it was the second time they'd heard about Harry that day… well, technically, the first wave of news had come the day before, since it was already past midnight. Still she wasn't sure if they should consider them anything more than gibberish.

The first reason for that was because they'd come from the mainstream wireless station _WWN_, whose news-casts were just as bad as the _Prophet_ these days. In fact, the only reason why they'd caught wind of the news the day before had been because they'd interrupted a daily wireless soapy drama she and her parents had recently gotten slightly addicted to in order to break them to the general public (and although her father vehemently affirmed that the only reason he listened to said drama was so he could be amused at how bad it was, he'd been the one out of the three of them who'd let out a very odd, almost girly, low-pitched scream when the previous day's broadcast had come to a halt just as the main characters were about to dramatically re-ignite their on-again, off-again romance).

The second reason was the content of the news itself. Apparently, Gringotts had been broken into. And apparently, Harry had been the one breaking in… and stealing a dragon. Because that was just what Harry Potter went around doing these days, Izzy thought sarcastically. Breaking into banks, stealing massive magical creatures that were so easy to hide in one's pocket, probably leading a gang of thugs as well, all with matching scars and tattoos… possibly with the shape of a lightning bolt. Honestly, it was just getting ridiculous how they could make Harry a scapegoat for everything. She was sure that if the sun blew up that very minute, the ministry would be pointing its finger at Harry sooner than the explosion could consume them as well.

She closed her eyes when she heard her name being said outside the door, which soon enough opened.

"_Mia, she's in here," _she heard her father whispering rather loudly to her mother, whose footsteps sounded next. "_Wasn't she already in bed when you and I went upstairs?_"

Izzy tensed, fearing her story might just start falling apart.

"_She probably had one of her insomnia bouts_," her mother whispered without much suspicion. "_Must've tried to lull herself to sleep with some telly_."

Her father didn't reply immediately, but she wasn't particularly nervous about that anymore – her mother's casual explanation seemed true enough.

"_Do you think we should wake her?_" she heard her father asking in a whisper after a few seconds.

Her mother hesitated in responding. "_Part of me does, so we can say…_" She paused, leaving the sentence unfinished. "_But the other_," Mia continued, "_tells me that if we do, she'll fight tooth and nail for us to let her go along and I just can't deal with that._"

Sirius sighed. "_We could leave a note. It'll be easier if she sleeps through most of it. Maybe later when we come back we can joke about how she slept through us saving the world_."

There was no answer from her mother's part. No sound. Before she knew it, she couldn't resist it – cracking one eye open. She didn't dare look up, though, so she just found herself looking at her parent's entwined hands.

When her mother's form moved towards her, Izzy closed her eye again. She heard a few faint movements and then felt her mother's lips softly touching her head. It took all her strength not to flinch or move suspiciously. "_We love you, honey,_" she whispered to her and, all of a sudden, for just a moment, Izzy actually wanted to give herself away by sitting up and hugging her mother. She didn't, though – she just barely managed to reply to her mother in the same manner, although it happened only inside her head.

She felt her mother pulling away, and then one hand was brushing her hair softly. "_We'll see you later, Izzybel," _she heard her father saying, just as the television sounding on the background up until then went quiet.

Seconds later they were walking away. She didn't hear them closing the door of the room again, though, so she couldn't tell if they were already out or just watching her or something. She got her answer when she heard them speaking to a third person nearby, though, by the sound of it, already outside of the room.

"_Look after them, Kreacher. And don't let them get scared – especially Alex and Mary. They're still so little…_" Mia was saying.

"_Kreacher protect Young Masters with his life_," the house-elf promised, without needing to be asked.

"_Thank you_," her mother said.

"_And if something happens to us…_" her father continued, "_or you don't get any news from us in the next twelve hours, you have the list. Use it._"

_List? What list?_ Izzy thought.

"_Yes, Master. First Mistress' parents, then Weezys, then Lupins, then…_"

"_Good, follow that order. Tell them we were hoping it wouldn't come to this, but that we trust them to look after the children when we can't._"

Izzy was stunned for a moment. By 'list', apparently they meant a list of people who were to be her and her siblings' guardians in case they… _That's rubbish. You're not dying! _She mentally shouted at her parents. No. No dying for them. Ever. They couldn't die. None of them. That was a thought she wouldn't even consider entertaining, because if she did, she would've already lost.

She soon heard the sound of her parents walking away and Kreacher dematerializing with the usual 'pop'. It was only when the front door downstairs closed with a bang, though, that she dared to fully open her eyes, let alone sit up on the sofa.

That was it, she thought. The moment of the truth. The time for action. The occasion when she'd finally have the chance to do something useful in that war. And, of course, she couldn't forget, the circumstance that might just lead to her seeing George again. That last one made her smile, while the others only served to mess with her nerves.

She shook her head and made herself focus on figuring out how to proceed. First of all, she needed to avoid Kreacher. She wasn't sure if by 'looking after them', her parents had also meant 'physically restrain Izzy if she tries to leave the house to come after us' but she had a feeling Kreacher might just choose to interpret it that way. Therefore, because she didn't want to hurt him, she chose to simply not give him the chance. That was for the best.

So, with the decision made, Izzy started looking around for something she could turn into a portkey. Her eyes landed on a nearly fully-melted candle resting on the mantle and she figured that might just do. Good. She had something to turn into a portkey. She had her wand. She was dressed. She had a pair of willies downstairs that were usually for the rain but would have to do that night. She had all she needed to go. Now all she needed was for everything to go well – namely making a portkey that would travel for miles rather than yards – or else she'd be in big trouble.

Finally, she got up, heading downstairs as silently as humanely possible. Keeping it silent became a little more complicated upon needing to put her shoes and cloak on by the door, but Kreacher still didn't show, oblivious to her plans to leave. She found a pair of gloves on the cloak's pocket and deemed them ideal to handle a portkey. With that, she put them on and placed the melted candle on the floor, taking a long breath as she looked at it while fetching her wand from her pocket.

_Alright,_ she told herself. _If this bloody thing doesn't work like it's supposed to, you could end up miles away from Hogsmeade, all alone and with no way to come back or move along because out there doing magic will set off the Trace. But no pressure. Just try not to get yourself stranded. Seriously don't._

So, she didn't tear her eyes off the intended object and tried to focus her mind as firmly as possible in the _Hog's Head_. It was a good thing it had made such a lasting impression the one time she'd been there (though by 'lasting', she didn't mean 'good' by any means), or else she might have been unable to picture it entirely. She focused on every grubby surface, dusty object and shady figure of the establishment. She recalled the location of it in Hogsmeade, of Hogsmeade in Scotland and of Scotland in the island of Great Britain. That last part was probably unnecessary but she didn't want to risk cutting corners. Then, she whispered the charm. "_Portus." _

The candle glowed as if it was lit for about ten seconds before it went back to looking normal, as molten as it had been before. She picked the portkey up, confident that, with the gloves on, it wouldn't do anything. Only direct contact with skin would activate it, she knew.

She allowed herself a moment of hesitation upon leaving the house. Deep in her chest, she had this feeling that everything would be different next time she found herself in there. That could either be very good or very bad… or just plain bad if the one change that came was her parents catching her and having her sent back home where she'd be expected by the mother of all punishments and a ruthless enforcer in the shape of Kreacher, who she could tell wouldn't like being fooled, even by his beloved Young Mistress.

The cold of the night hit her face for the first time in months the moment she stepped out through the door, Portkey in hand. It came surprisingly bittersweet, a very mix of fear and excitement. She made herself remain on the front step even as she closed the door behind her – on it, while the Fidelius charm still kept her out of unwanted sights, the house wards no longer bound or protected her.

She swallowed hard, allowing herself five to just breathe in and out. That was all Izzy was willing to concede to the nerves and that was all she indeed conceded before starting to pull her right glove off, baring her hand.

"Here goes nothing," she whispered a bit shakily. She was going to fight. They were going to win. "Please let us all live through tonight," she asked of no person or entity in particular.

And so, with a brush of her hand against the side of the candle, the world vanished around her. And, from then on, nothing would indeed ever be the same.

**A/N2: I wonder what will happen next chapter... some knitting, maybe. Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	63. The Final Battle pt 1

**A/N: Straight from my cold-fuelled sickbed, here is (finally) the Final Battle. I don't think I ever had a chapter that was this hard to write, with so much stuff happening at the same time. Nearly went mad with it. Anyway, I hope you like it. This is just the first part of the battle, by the way.**

**Enjoy!**

"Where is he?" Mia frantically asked. "Where's Harry?"

She rushed into the Room of Requirement like a hurricane, coming from the secret passage that now connected the school with The Hog's Head with Sirius in a tow. Her eyes scanned every square foot of the room – it looked more like a dorm than any other layout they'd ever seen in the room before – in search for her godson… in vain, one might add, as he was nowhere to be seen. There were, in fact, very little people in the room at the moment. Only two, actually – Molly and Ginny

Molly was the first to turn her attention to Mia, having taken a break from her apparent lecture to a rather defiant Ginny, who kept eyeing the door like she was trying to find an opportunity to run for it.

"You've just missed him, dear," the older redhead explained. "He was here just a few minutes ago… ten, at the most – I saw him leaving with Luna Lovegood just as I arrived."

Mia's face turned to disappointment. She'd been hoping to run into her godson before things got worse and have the chance to see that he was okay… maybe hold him for a minute and wish him good luck in his ordeal. But it seemed fate wasn't on her side that day.

"Where is Izzy?" Ginny asked then, clearly eyeing the secret passage's exit in hope her best friend would come out.

"Home," Mia replied, not going into detail.

Ginny frowned. "Home?"

"Yes, _home. _Which is exactly where you should be," Molly told her.

"But Mum…!" the younger girl said, exasperated.

"I told you you're not fighting today! If you want, you can lock yourself in this room and wait here like Remus suggested but that's the closest you'll get to the battle today. I don't know how you and your brothers got the message before we did, but you had no business sneaking your way into this school with them!" Molly yelled.

"Five months, Mum! I'll be of age in five months. That's the difference between being able to fight alongside my friends and staying behind like some… some potted plant!"

"Then you can come by in five months and cross that door," she said, pointing at the room's entrance. "In the meanwhile, you can go sit on that chair, or else I'm taking you home myself!"

Ginny let out a strangled sound of frustration, before turning to Sirius and Mia, hoping they'd intervene. They didn't – they knew better than that, knowing that, if she was Izzy, they'd be doing just the same. So, hopelessly livid, the youngest redhead had to do as she was told. She didn't stop eyeing the door, though. For a moment, Sirius was thankful his daughter had been asleep when they'd left, or else they might have needed to deal with a similar situation.

"What is it with children these days?" Molly commented in annoyance.

"_I'm not a child!_" Ginny shouted from her seat, earning herself a glare from her mother, who didn't grace her statement with any sort of response other than said glare.

"Can you tell us what happened while we were gone?"

Molly nodded, proceeding to share her account of the events: how she'd gotten there to see Harry leaving to go look for something in the Ravenclaw tower; how Death Eaters had arrived just outside of the school all of a sudden, where they currently lay in wait; and how Voldemort had given them a deadline to hand Harry over to him in return for sparing the school from a bloody battle. "Of course, I'm sure no one is even considering giving in," Molly assured them. "We know that even if Harry was handed over, You-Know-Who would find another reason to attack us – if it wasn't today, it would be tomorrow or the day after… Still, they said we had until three."

Sirius checked his watch. "That's about half an hour away."

Molly nodded. "Everyone is all over the castle preparing already: underage students are being evacuated through here, the wards are being strengthened to hold them off a little longer, traps are being set up…"

"And I should be out there helping," Ginny mumbled to herself on her seat.

"One more word, Ginny. One more word and I'm changing my mind," Molly warned her daughter just as the sound of several voices and multiple footsteps reached their ears, coming from the outside.

McGonagall stepped into the room a few seconds later, a group of about a dozen students waiting to be evacuated in a tow. "Ah, Mia, good that you're here," the older woman said once she spotted her and Sirius. "I was just having a word with Poppy five minutes ago. She's setting up things in the Hospital Wing but she's not sure she and the nurses will be able to handle all the injured. I was hoping you could lend her a hand."

"Do you think it will get _that_ bad?" Sirius asked, feeling himself grow anxious.

The woman looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Sirius, Voldemort is just outside the school gates with the full force of his army on a tow. Since I doubt anyone on our side would be willing to hand your godson over or let Voldemort himself come in here to get Harry without a fight, yes, it may just get _that _bad."

"Minerva! Are you supposed to say his name?! It's taboo!" Molly said in alarm.

"He's already here, Molly," the rightful headmistress said as the students in the background were guided to the passage to the Hog's Head by Filch, who'd just joined them with his cat (why ever he thought she could come useful at that particular occasion was beyond anyone in the room's understanding). "Might as well use it up, now that we can." She turned to Sirius and Mia, then. "As I was saying, things may get very bad and Poppy can only do so much with only a handful of nurses to assist. She could use someone with full healing training."

"I haven't practiced in years, Minerva," Mia stated.

"Surely you haven't forgotten the spells or which potion heals which ailment."

"Well, no. But I'm rusty. I could get in the way."

McGonagall waved it off, clearly showing she regarded that part as nonsense. "You couldn't get in the way half as much as some untrained volunteer they might find even if you tried. So, will you go, then? We could use some people to guard the Hospital Wing too, Sirius."

Sirius was reluctant. "I was actually thinking I might go and find Harry."

"Good luck with that. He's running around the castle like a lunatic looking for the Grey Lady."

"_The Grey Lady? As in the ghost?_" Ginny asked from her seat, overhearing the conversation.

"Ginny!" Molly shouted.

"What? It's a legitimate question!"

The headmistress nodded, ignoring the mother-daughter antics. "Potter is somehow convinced she can help him find whatever he's looking for," she explained before turning to Sirius again. "As long as you and Mia are settled in one place, though, I might be able to get him to go to you by spreading the word that you're looking for him."

Sirius and Mia looked at each other. The older woman did have a point: the castle was massive and he didn't have the Marauders Map on him, so finding his godson when he was on the move would be as easy as spotting a needle in a haystack. So, without needing to share a word, they agreed. "Okay, Minerva. We'll go there."

"Good," the headmistress said with a nod. "You should know that the Order is unblocking the secret passages, especially the ones leading out of the castle. I take it you'll be able to find the fastest way out through them in case patients need to be evacuated, Sirius."

He nodded. "There's not a direct one from the Hospital Wing but can I think of a couple that should do the job put together."

"Sounds good enough. Now, if you don't mind, I need to make a quick trip to the Hog's Head and make sure the evacuation is going as planned from there. Good luck, you two," McGonagall said before heading over to the secret passage's entrance.

After wishing luck to Molly and Ginny as well – hoping they wouldn't need it, but knowing one could never have too much of it –, Sirius and Mia were off to the Hospital Wing.

On the way there, the signs of people getting ready for the battle were clear: they ran into groups of students, most from the DA setting up barricades and traps; professors running around with weapons related to their own subjects – Mandrakes for Sprout, exploding potions for Slughorn and crystal balls for Trelawney… Even Peeves was helping, letting down chandeliers so Flitwick could charm them into falling when a group of Death Eaters was under them. Seeing the school united to defend itself was at the same terrifying and uplifting.

When they reached the Hospital Wing, they found Madam Pomfrey running around it like mad, going from assisting three nurses as they sorted through the healing to watching a line of fuming cauldrons at the end of it.

"Poppy, Molly said you could use a hand," Mia said, alerting the matron to her presence.

"Ah, yes. Good. Perfect. I need you to start setting up some extra beds in my office – I don't think these ones will be enough. Just transfigure anything into them. Anna, Mrs Podmore and… I'm sorry, what's your name again, dear?" she asked a nurse Mia didn't recognize. Aside from Anna, Pomfrey's regular nurse, it seemed the unnamed nurse and another plump, older one Mia vaguely remembered being introduced to her as Sturgis Podmore's wife during an Order meeting, had joined the team.

"Nerys, ma'am," she said in a welsh accent. "And it seems we're out of dittany."

"Yes, Nerys. Alright. Well, you, Anna and Mrs Podmore can help Amelia with the beds when you're done. I need to keep an eye on the potions – I've already accelerated the brewing a little too much for them to be as effective as they're supposed to. Wouldn't want to add up to the tragedy by burning them. Now you, Black," the matron said, turning to Sirius.

"Yes, me," he said, surprised she had a task for him as well.

The woman tossed him a set of keys. "Go to the dungeons. You'll find an extra supply room in there. It's the…"

"…third door on the left from the Potions classroom. Yes, I know," he replied. He might or might not have found his way there in the past and might or might not have 'borrowed' some supplies in order to tend wounds acquired during less… proper ventures with his friends.

Pomfrey raised her eyebrows at him. "I won't even ask. Anyway, get plenty of dittany from there and bring it here… in fact, get as much of everything as you can possibly carry. Find some extra hands if you can, even. Oh and don't be alarmed if you accidentally step on an unconscious Carrow over there – they shouldn't be up for hours. Minerva reckoned they might have rigged the cells' locks in case of mutiny, so she put them in there instead. Just make sure you lock up after yourself."

Sirius eyed the woman incredulously. "Should I worry about finding Snape there as well?"

The woman frowned. "Too smart to get caught, that one. Made a run for it the moment the tables turned. I reckon he must be outside the gates with his blasted master. Now, off you go. Time is ticking."

And ticking it was, indeed. It wasn't comfortable working under pressure, but it was certainly effective. Maybe it was the adrenaline, Mia mused as she worked. The fact was that she managed to cram into about fifteen minutes an amount of work that, in normal circumstances would have taken at least double. Once she was done, she allowed herself a moment to look out the window.

From there, she could see them at a distance: the sea of Death Eaters just outside the gates, in the midst of torches and faint moonlight from the last quarter. To be honest, she hadn't ever really stopped to calculate just how many of them there were. Hundreds, she'd always assumed. Now, looking at them, she wondered if they weren't thousands, instead… How could a single man – if Voldemort could even be called a 'man' – have gathered such a large circle of hate? Then again, she thought, he'd been in power for a year. How many of these people in the sea of Death Eaters were there unwillingly? How many had been imperiused into fighting for something they didn't support? The Imperius curse was a known excuse used by Death Eaters to justify their actions, but she had to wonder if, in some cases it wasn't the truth.

"Six minutes until they burst in," she heard her husband's familiar voice saying as he joined her at the window. She hadn't even noticed him returning.

"If they don't get tired of waiting and come early, you mean," she pointed out. They seemed quite jumpy, even at a distance, like they were craving for blood.

"Well, there's that. But then again, five minutes less or five minutes more don't really matter. Everything looked set up outside – everyone's just waiting," he told her.

And, just like that, it was set in stone. Any marginal hope she'd had that it would all turn out to be just a big scare, that the battle wouldn't actually take place, was gone. Now, all she could hope for was that they'd survive that night despite it.

"_Sirius, Aunt Mia_," they heard a familiar voice saying behind them.

The two of them turned around in a flash and found themselves facing Harry. "Oh, thank Merlin," Mia whispered before crossing the distance between them and wrapping her godson in a bone-crushing hug.

"C'mon, Mia. Try not to break the kid in half. At least not until he's done saving the Wizarding World," Sirius warned his wife.

"Thanks," Harry managed to choke out as Mia loosened her hold.

"You're welcome as always, kid," his godfather said with a grin, patting him on the back.

"Are you okay?" Mia asked, anxiously. "Have you been eating well? And sleeping? We can't have you running around ready to faint or anything."

"I'm not ready to faint! I'm fine," Harry told her in a slightly defensive tone (blokes didn't _faint!_), feeling at the same time annoyed and elated at the motherly nagging. "You can have a report from my eating and sleeping habits from Fleur, if you want. She's been mothering us like you wouldn't believe."

"Fleur?" Sirius asked. "So, that's where you've been staying at, then. Bill's."

He nodded. "Yeah. But, listen, I don't have a lot of time. I'm sort of in the middle of something and only really came by right now because Seamus told me you were here when I was just around the corner. I couldn't really walk off without at least stopping by to check on you."

Mia nodded, understandingly. "Of course. So, is it the Horcrux? Did you find it?"

Harry shook his head. "Not yet but I think I know where it is. I'm heading out to get it right now."

"Do you want any help with that?" Sirius inquired.

Harry let out a sigh. "Everyone's offering today," he mumbled. "I'm thankful, really, but it's just…" he huffed, thinking of how to word it "… too much, I guess. Look, the best way you can help me right now, is by staying here and helping the people who are helping me. Please. Just… worry about not getting hurt. That's the best you can do for me."

Their first instinct would have been to protest their godson's dismissal. Still, something in the way he'd put it made them not to. He'd been off on his own for months and he'd probably been through more than they could guess: he'd grown. Not just grown _grown _but also grown independent. And, in a way – not a mean way, mostly just a practical one – he was letting them know that by joining him they might get on his way or somehow disturb the fluidity of the way he handled things now. And that was something they just couldn't afford.

"Well, you be careful too, then," Mia said. "Worrying about not hurting yourself for someone else's peace of mind is a two-way street."

"I'll try my best at it – I always do, unbelievable as it is." He checked his watch and frowned. "I really need to go. I just have to ask first: is Izzy hiding around here somewhere?"

Sirius shook his head. "She was asleep – thank Merlin – when the news came. Hopefully, she'll wake up in the morning to quite an interesting story over breakfast. With all of us around the table with her."

Harry smiled. "That's something to look forward to." He sighed. "Alright, it's time. I have to go."

Mia nodded, leaning forward to give him another hug. "I hope you won't need it, but, in case you do: good luck."

"Yeah, same to you," he replied in the same manner. And thank you."

"What for?" Sirius asked.

Harry shrugged. "Too much stuff to name in one go." And then, he was off to that mission of his.

Then, it was as if something clicked with his exit. One look out the window showed the Death Eaters breaking through the wards like they were made of glass and bursting into the school like water through a crumbling dam.

And then it was eight minutes. Exactly eight minutes before all hell broke loose in the Hospital Wing. Thankfully, no Death Eaters made their way there: Sirius was part of just one of the many lines of defence McGonagall had apparently created to guard the infirmary, making it one of the closest things to a safe haven in the warring school. They went from people guarding the doors to local wards encouraging people with the Dark Mark on their arms to turn away, the same way Muggles were encouraged to ignore Hogwarts as just one more of many Scottish ruins. While those sorts of wards rarely worked at large scale to wizard minds, they seemed to do the job adequately for the most weak-minded Death Eaters (most of them, if one was honest) at a smaller scale… at least for as long as they lasted, which probably wasn't that long with Voldemort shattering the school wards one by one. Hopefully, by the time those failed, most Death Eaters would be either down or otherwise occupied in duels.

Inside, chaos reigned as injured fighters started raining down on them like cats and dogs. Some walked on their own, which was always a good sign, others were carried unconscious. Usually, the ones who walked on their own were quickly patched up and allowed to return to the fight… the unconscious ones took longer and sometimes had to be evacuated by a couple of Kingsley's Aurors who stood around for that sole purpose, having been briefed by Sirius on the best secret passages out of the school.

So far, no one had died under her care, which Mia found nothing short of a miracle. But then again, who knew what happened after the patients were evacuated, some barely stable? Or how many lay on the school corridors, too far gone to be healed?

In the meanwhile, as his wife healed inside, Sirius guarded the doors, waiting for the next poor injured sod to show up. Because he had no doubt there would be more of them, even if it might take a while. Sometimes they came as if in groups, others there was a few minutes between each one, but they always came, sometimes more than one time each. He'd need more than a hand to count those who'd left the Hospital Wing fully healed only to return all messed up again just a little later.

"_Sirius!_" he heard his name being called. It was Hestia Jones running from the end of the corridor. She'd been there maybe three or four times already, once to heal herself and the others helping someone else. That time, however, she seemed neither injured nor carrying someone that was – that task had apparently been left for Kingsley, who walked behind her with someone unconscious in his arms. He couldn't see who it was due to Hestia being on the way.

"Another one?" Sirius asked, approaching them in order to lend a hand.

"Sirius, you need to stay calm," Kingsley said from behind the woman.

He frowned in confusion as he kept walking. "I _am _calm. That's not exactly the first person that arrives here. One gets used to it at some point, as messed up as it is."

"It's not just any person, Sirius," Hestia said. "We found her running from a group of Death Eaters on her own. First of all, you need to know she's…"

His fellow order member's voice faded into abstract ringing before he could finish hearing her. She could've been shouting and he wouldn't have heard her because, all of a sudden he knew why they were telling him to stay calm. And all of a sudden the last thing he could was just that – staying calm. Because, as Hestia moved out of the way, he saw the face of the person Kingsley Shacklebolt was carrying.

And that person was his daughter.

* * *

**Earlier in Hogsmeade**

In hindsight, it would have probably been too much to ask the Portkey to land her exactly where she wanted, Izzy mused.

It was, after all, the first time she used one of those to travel farther than a few dozen yards .In normal circumstances, landing within a mile of the intended destination would have probably been a fairly decent result, considering her experience, and so, she'd half-heartedly prepared herself mentally to the possibility that she might end up stranded somewhere. She didn't, however, prepare herself for the Portkey to drop her from about twenty-five feet above the ground.

Before she could even react, she found herself falling through the air... only to stop after about five feet, when she found herself falling arse-first onto the roof of a building thankfully placed right beneath the spot she'd fallen from.

It was several seconds before she unfroze, more than a little relieved she hadn't gotten herself killed or severely injured. _Bloody hell, that was close,_ she thought as her heart raced in her chest. Aside from a sore bum, she was pretty sure she was fine.

She sat up slowly, mindful of the possibility she might just slide down from the high ceiling she was currently on and end her lucky break right there and then. She took a look at her surroundings and found herself smiling at the fact that she was surrounded by the unmistakable roofs of Hogsmeade. Now, all she needed was to find a way to get down from there...

There was no need to think for very long, though as, before she even had a chance to start sizing the logistics, a roof window a few of feet away opened and a grumpy-looking old man poked his head out.

"Oi! What are you doing on my roof, girl?" the man barked at her.

"Er... I sort of... landed here by accident," she awkwardly explained. "Sorry about that. Small portkey miscalculation."

"Small portkey...? What are you doing outside after curfew, anyway? Trying to get your arse dragged over to Azkaban? Bloody kids these days, always pushing their luck..."

"I wouldn't be out if I didn't have to be out," she replied testily. "Look, if you could just help me down and point me to the Hog's Head, I'll be out of your hair."

"Out of my hair... not bloody likely. Downwards," he replied.

"What?"

"You wanted directions to the Hog's Head, lass. You're _on _it."

"Oh," she mumbled. So that must be old Aberforth, she concluded. She'd seen him before, back in her fourth year when the DA had been formed, but back then, not knowing the man was Dumbledore's brother, she hadn't looked at him twice. "Then I guess I'm here for..."

"I can guess what you're here for, lass. Bloody place is like a public road tonight," he grumbled, clearly dissatisfied. "Just get in here quick... and don't you fall that roof. Don't what the Death Eaters at the school gates to suddenly turn their attention here. Besides, a kid all smashed up on the pavement in front of my pub would be bad for business."

"Thanks for the concern," she mumbled dryly back to the man, shifting her position so she could try and crawl to the little window.

The pub-owner didn't offer a hand once – not that Izzy had expected it, really – and just watched grouchily as she climbed through the narrow opening into what seemed to be his attic.

"Okay, so… if you could point me the way to Hogwarts…" she said as she used her hands to brush the roof's dirt off her clothes.

Aberforth eyed her sceptically for a moment. "How old are you?"

She frowned – the man was just infuriating. One minute he acted like she was a bloody nuisance, the other he seemed to care if she was or wasn't too young to fight. "Old enough to get here on my own," she replied, trying to imply she was of age.

"Not old enough to apparate, though."

"I'm prone to splinching," she mumbled. That part was true, at least.

"Most kids are," he replied.

"I'm not a kid. And I know how to fight well enough, if that's what you're getting to," she firmly stated.

The older man keep looking at her in the same sceptical manner before shrugging, as if asking himself why he was bothering when he didn't even know the girl, and turned his back. "Do what you will, lass. It's your life and you're not my kid. If you want to be stupid with it, go ahead." And, with that, he made his way out of the room.

He didn't tell her to follow, but she still did, guessing he'd be taking her to whatever way he had for people to go in and out of Hogwarts through his pub. They ended up in a darkened room with a large portrait of a young girl. Later, she'd realize it must've been Dumbledore's late sister but at the moment she didn't really think beyond how on Earth she was supposed to get to Hogwarts through a room whose single opening was the door she'd come through.

"The kid needs to go in… hopefully she's the last one," Aberforth told the young girl in the portrait, who nodded at him with a smile.

Before Izzy had a chance to ask what was going on, the large portrait started to move like a door, revealing a tunnel hidden behind it. She stared for a moment: had that thing always been there? Because in the long months she'd spent in Death-Eater-occupied Hogwarts, she'd gotten very well-acquainted with the many secret passages in the Marauders Map (supposedly all of them) and she was sure that one in particular wasn't among them.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" the older man asked. "Weren't you so eager to get yourself in the battlefield just a minute ago?"

"Right. Yes," she mumbled. "Where is that exactly supposed to lead to in Hogwarts?"

"The Room of Requirement. And tell your friends over there they'd better seal off the damn thing – I don't want bloody Death Eaters coming through here into my pub," the man let her know.

Izzy raised her eyebrows – Aberforth was clearly not planning to lend a hand in the battle. Then again, who was she to bring that up? His role in letting people pass through his pub was, after all, no doubt invaluable in getting the Order into the school. "Right. Thanks."

He replied with a nod before she made her way to the tunnel and climbed into it the passage, which revealed itself not as cramped as one might have expected and consisting mostly of stairs. It was lit inside by brass lamps hanging from the walls, so once the Portrait closed behind her, she was not in the dark.

She felt a bit nervous walking through the unfamiliar path on her own – her steps echoing up and down the stairs. To be honest, it wasn't just about being all alone in there. She was basically walking into what could very well be hell on Earth and she knew she should be at the very least hesitant about it, which didn't happen to be the case. Maybe there was something wrong with her – she knew she was being reckless, which seemed to run in the family, still she didn't care. The thought of staying home for hours waiting to hear if her family had made it was just too unbearable as an alternative.

It took her some good ten minutes to get through the whole passage, the steps so steep at the end that she was nearly panting once she emerged from the little door similar to the one back at the pub.

"Bloody hell, how did you get yourself in here?" a familiar voice asked her from the other end of the room, which presented a rather unfamiliar layout at the moment.

Looking at the source, Izzy quickly spotted Ginny making her way to her from where she'd been standing right next to the room's large closed doors. She had her wand in her hand as if she'd been prepared to attack whoever had been coming through the secret passage until realising it was her.

"I didn't think you were coming. Your mum said you'd stayed home, so I reckoned that was it for you. How did you get here on your own?" Ginny asked.

"Portkey. Lots of luck," Izzy mumbled. "I was half sure I'd strand myself in Southampton or something." She shook her head. "Anyway, so my parents are already out there?"

The redhead nodded, proceeding to summarize the events of the night as well as she could in order to bring her friend up to date on the current state of things.

"What are you still doing here, then?" Izzy asked the other girl once she was done explaining what had been going on. She didn't say it in an accusatory fashion – more in a surprised one. Anyone who knew Ginny had to be sure that, under normal circumstances she'd already be downstairs waiting to wipe the floor with some Death Eater-shaped mops (or at the very least wishing to).

"I had to promise Mum I wouldn't leave this room unless I had absolutely no other choice, or else she'd have made me go back home. I'm not a fan of breaking promises, so I was giving it a little time, hoping the whole 'no other choice' part does happen."

"How long have you waited?"

"Little more than five minutes, I think. I'm giving it fifteen and then I'm out of here, broken promise or not. At least I tried to keep it," Ginny pointed out.

"Yeah… not really in the way your mother was hoping you would, though," Izzy remarked.

"Look who's talking – didn't _your _parents tell you to stay home or something?"

"Actually, they didn't – they snuck out while I was asleep… well, pretending to be asleep, anyway. In any case, they didn't tell me _not_ to come."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "As if it wasn't implied…"

"What? Now _you_'re lecturing me?"

"No – I was just stating a fact."

"Well, so was…" The sudden sound of loud banging on the room's doors kept Izzy from finishing that sentence.

The two girls tensed, staring at the large doors with wide eyes.

"_Ginny! Ginny!_" a familiar voice called from the other side.

And, just like that, tension became relief – Ginny was soon on her feet and speeding to the door. "Harry?" she asked

"_Yes. But don't just take my word for it. Ask something._"

"_Oi! But nothing about the weird stuff you two do behind closed doors – Hermione and I are out here_," her brother's voice suddenly added.

"Well, since you're there and can vouch for Harry, _you_ can answer the question," Ginny dared him. "What did you say you wanted to be when you grew up?"

"_A Quidditch Player for the Cannons._"

"Wrong – that's not what I recall Fred and George telling me about."

"_That's because they're jerks and they tricked me into thinking that was what people nicknamed the Cannons' players_."

"You're wasting time, Ron. I want to hear it."

"_You're just as bad as they are! Fine! Have a laugh, then: a ballerina. I used to say I wanted to be a ballerina. By which I meant Quidditch Player for the Cannons. Happy now?_"

Ginny snorted and, satisfied, opened the door.

"I was three and I was gullible," Ron was telling Harry and Hermione just as Ginny laid eyes on him.

"Of course you were – they tricked you," Hermione was saying as she understandingly – and quite intimately – placed her arm around Ron's shoulders. Ginny half expected him to freak out like his idiot self usually did upon contact with his very obvious crush, but he didn't. He just stood there, happily milking her support while carrying in his arms…

"Are those basilisk fangs?!" Ginny half-shouted once she recognized the items on her brother's possession. Very white, very sharp and very familiar snake fangs like the one that had been sticking out of Tom Riddle's diary back when Harry had saved her from the Chamber of Secrets all those years ago.

"Yeah… it's a long story and…" Harry turned to Izzy "…why are your parents under the impression that you're home asleep when you clearly aren't?"

"Oh, are they?" Izzy replied, feigning confusion as she approached to give him a hug.

Harry huffed over her shoulder. "Why am I not surprised that you're not?"

"I missed you too," she replied with a smile, kissing him on the cheek before pulling apart.

"Right… listen, we need you to leave the room."

Ginny's face lit up immediately at that, as if Christmas had come early. "Do you now?"

"Yeah – I think there's a Horcrux we need to find in here… well, not in here, in another room in this room… you know what I mean. A different layout. Anyway, we need the room to be empty for it to shift, so…"

"You really need us out of this room," Ginny finished for him, openly grinning.

He was clearly confused by her apparent elation. "That's what I'm saying."

"The fate of the world _depends_ on it," she continued.

"Yeah… kind of."

"There really is _absolutely no other choice_."

"Er… sure. Ginny, what's going on?"

She didn't respond, instead just stepping forward, grabbing her boyfriend's face and planting a big one on him, which had Ron turning his back with a mortified 'bloody hell'.

When she pulled away, he eyed her at complete loss. "I'm confused now."

She patted his cheek, in a slightly patronizing manner. "Don't be, Potter. I bloody love you and you'd better live through this because I kind of need you to tell my mum just that."

"That you bloody love me?"

"No – that the fate of the world depended on me leaving this room, so I didn't really break my promise to stay in here until I absolutely _had_ to leave."

"Oh, but if you just wait a little, you'll probably be able to go back in… In fact, you _should_ probably go back in."

She covered her ears like a little kid. "I'm sorry, what? I didn't hear that last part."

"Yes, you did. I _know_ you did."

"Did not and if you're going to be difficult about it, I'm going to find myself useful elsewhere," she warned him.

"Ginny…"

She stopped him with another kiss, which had Ron once again cursing, that time with Izzy along for the ride, slightly annoyed at the continuous displays of affection between her best friend and her _brother._

"If you die, I'll be very cross, so do us both a favour and don't. I'll try to do the same," she told Harry. "And I still love you, even when you're being an overprotective git."

Harry let out a huff of resigned acceptance. "I love you too. Be safe."

"Always am," she assured him, before stepping back and walking over to the door. "Come along, Izzy. Let's find ourselves something interesting to do."

"Let's," Izzy agreed, following her friend as she walked out.

"Hey! The part about going back into the room after we're done also applied to you, Izzy," Harry shouted after them.

Izzy turned back to him for a moment. "After all the trouble I went through to get here? No, thanks."

"They'll be furious," he warned her, referring to his godparents.

"I know," she replied. "Good luck finding the Horcrux."

"Good luck facing Aunt Mia's wrath."

She chuckled, turning on her heel and walking away. Sometime before they had to take a turn at the end of the hallway, they were stopped by the sound of someone shouting the word 'wait' repeatedly from behind them. When they turned, they saw it wasn't directed to them but instead to the Trio – at a distance, a very rushed Tonks seemed to be hurrying out of the Room of Requirement at the last minute, having just arrived at the school for the battle. She said something to Harry for a moment and disappeared on the direction opposite to theirs without even noticing them.

They resumed walking on their own seconds later, soon reaching one of the secondary staircases and making their way down to the sixth floor and, later, after several minutes walking, to the fifth. They didn't run into a single Death Eater on their way down – it hardly seemed like a battle so far.

"They must only just be arriving now. The Death Eaters," Ginny said when her friend brought it up to her. "Voldemort gave us until three to deliver Harry. My guess is that even when they reach the castle, they'll start by the lower floors."

And so they descended two more floors without running into more than students, teachers and Order members, although the sound of explosions and shatters were already making themselves heard downstairs. They were on the third floor when they heard the first group of Death Eaters approaching.

Even as they stopped at a corner where two hallways met and took a peak at the direction of the Death Eater's voices, the group was still out of sight. Going further in their direction was too much of a risk, as it might completely expose them if the Death Eaters moved. Still, they needed to see how many they were – maybe with the surprise element, they could handle three or four of them on their own. More than that would be biting far more than they could chew.

Ginny poked her arm, pointing at the hallway behind them. "I think if I go through there and then turn left, I might be able to take a peek at them from the end of the hall without them noticing me. Can you stay here to send me a Patronus in case they start moving my way?"

Izzy nodded. "Don't take too long, though. Better stick together."

She watched the redhead reply with an agreeing nod before heading the direction she'd pointed as silently as she could manage. Izzy then turned her face back to where she could hear one of the Death Eaters instructing the others and stood there watching. It was hard to understand the words being said both due to the sounds of battle downstairs and the fact that they were talking rather quietly. She thought she heard something about waiting and a sign, but she could've misheard it. Then again, if she hadn't, that might explain why they were just standing around.

Every few seconds, she glanced at her watch to check how long it had been since Ginny had gone. And with every turn, she started growing more and more nervous. One minute passed… then two… then three. It shouldn't have Ginny more than… two? Two and a half? One minute to go, a few seconds to peak and another to return. It was only a few yards, after all, and yet her friend had been gone nearly four minutes. Something had to be wrong and she couldn't just stand there waiting. She had to go see what Ginny was up to.

She moved silently along the corridor and, upon turning left at the end, saw no sign of Ginny. Panic hit her for about ten seconds, during which she just stood there like a sitting duck staring at the spot where Ginny should've been. At the ten second mark, she forced herself to stop – she needed to check if there were signs of a struggle or something.

Before she could reach the end of the hall, though, she stopped next to a classroom's entrance – she vaguely noted it was the school orchestra's rehearsal room –, from where she heard hushed voices coming. It was with relief that she realized one of them was Ginny's.

"…_can't just go around snatching people! Who does that?_" she was whispering furiously to someone else.

For a moment, Izzy was confused. Was her best friend seriously lecturing a _Death Eater_?! She was going to get herself killed!

Gripping the wand she was already holding much harder than before, Izzy stepped quietly towards the door, pushing it further open and slipping in. The room had some sort of antechamber, which she was thankful for, as it allowed her to get in unnoticed and still gave her the opportunity to lock the door closed behind her the other Death Eaters wouldn't be a bother.

Yet, before she had a chance to attack, the 'Death Eater' spoke, causing her to freeze. "_Someone who isn't all that happy to spot their sister walking around all alone in the middle of a battle. Do you know just how stupid that is?"_

"_I wasn't on my own!" _Ginny protested.

"_Oh, really? Who were you with, then? Some sort of invisible entity I completely failed to see?_"

"No, she was with me," Izzy announced as she made her out of the antechamber and into the actual classroom, quickly spotting the two Weasleys at the far end of the room.

While Ginny simply grinned victoriously, her brother – very clearly George, though at that moment she couldn't name the many signs that had given it away – turned on his heel and stared at her. The stare soon became an unimpressed frown and Izzy felt herself inwardly huffing, half-expecting him to start lecturing her about putting herself in danger right then and there – why did he have to feel the constant need to protect her? It might be sweet at times but it just felt bloody annoying at the moment.

"I feel like I should be a lot more surprised that you somehow managed to sneak your way here now of all times," he stated. "And far more annoyed about it than I currently am."

Izzy was surprised to note that, beyond the two-second frown he'd worn before, he didn't seem annoyed at all anymore. In fact, his lips were starting to curl. And that was basically it for her.

Trying to contain the smile that forced its way into her face was a lost cause, just as it was resisting the urge to make her way closer to him. In fact, her pace seemed to increase the closer she got until she found herself in a mild run.

He caught her in a hug the moment she reached him like it was the most natural thing in the world. It surprised her and it didn't at the same time. Somehow, they'd gotten to that place during their months of separation: a place where they weren't quite just friends but not yet a couple. A place where they cared for each other and weren't fearful of showing it to the other. She liked that place. She really did. It was like a breath of fresh air.

"I missed you," she whispered against his ear as he held her, actually lifting her several inches from the ground.

"I missed you too," he replied. "But you shouldn't be here, Isabelle."

"Be quiet and don't ruin the moment. I've been waiting for it far too long," she said, the last part slipping before she could stop herself.

"That makes two of us," he replied.

Ginny cleared her throat, reminding them of her presence, just as George was putting Izzy back down. They looked at her sheepishly, having literally forgotten Ginny was there for a few seconds, mostly due to the fact that she'd done nothing but being quiet while they… reunited. Both of them were thankful for that… almost as thankful as they were for her next offer.

"Okay, I'm going to make the two of you a deal – a deal that is strictly the one-time sort, mostly fuelled by the fact that, like it or not, we could all be dead in the morning," the redhead informed them. "I'm going to turn my back for five minutes, cover my ears and think of England so the two of you can do your… _thing_. In return, you're going to allow me to believe that your… _thing_ was nothing more than polite handshaking and courteous chatting – not that I don't approve of this… _thing _of yours, mind you. But you're my brother and she's my best friend, which makes picturing whatever might go on behind my back other than handshaking just wrong. Now, does this arrangement sound suitable or will I have to be a bitch about it?"

While Izzy simply responded with a pair of raised eyebrows at her best friend, George was quick to make himself heard. "Do you know what I can't understand about this arrangement?"

"What?"

"Why it wasn't brought up when you and Harry were the ones it could apply to. Because, really, I did _not_ need to see…"

"Time's counting!" Ginny interrupted him, conveniently turning her back and placing her hands over her ears before he could finish. "Five minutes!"

George rolled his eyes but quickly turned his attention to Izzy. Time was precious for them and, at the moment, apparently in a countdown. "So… five minutes," he said, sitting down on a chair opposite a tall sheet-music holder

Izzy nodded, sitting next to him and slumping down against the back of the chair. "Yeah."

"Not really enough to have that major defining conversation about… us that I promised you last time we were together," he mumbled, sounding disappointed.

She shook her head. "I'd have pushed for more time, really, but there are Death Eaters right around the corner. Five's already pushing it," she offered. "Then again, I guess that getting ourselves killed for the sake of 'the talk' would pretty much defeat the point of having it in the first place, wouldn't it?"

He chuckled. "Monumentally so, I'd say," he agreed before pausing and sighing. "We have the worst timing, don't we, Isabelle?" He said it in a strange way: with a smile on his face, sounding almost fond. Oddly, it made her want to smile too.

They did have awful timing, always heading straight into bumps and blockages on the road, but somehow, as annoyed as said bumps had made her in the past – and still made her now – she felt like, somehow, without them they wouldn't be where they were at that moment. And she liked where they were. It felt good. It felt… strong. At the end of the day, maybe without those bumps on the road they'd have been together for months already but, somehow, for some reason, she had a feeling that she wouldn't have felt as strongly for him then as she did now.

"I think it's worth it," she told him simply, looking sideways at him and smiling.

"Yeah?" he asked, apparently glad she'd said that. "I thought so too." He looked away, thoughtful, and without giving it much thought, his hand moved to lie on top of hers, which had been resting on her knee.

Izzy, on the other hand, turned her hand upwards, lacing their fingers together as she tipped her head sideways to rest on his shoulder.

"Funny thing how, when you're on a countdown, all the stuff you've been planning to say just flies out of the window," he pointed out. "And I had a lot to say."

"So did I," she admitted. "Maybe we should have drawn a picture about it – made a diagram or something. Muggles say pictures are worth a thousand words," Izzy half-joked.

"Yeah?" he asked. "Couple of problems, though: my drawing skills are laughable even to a three-year-old and, as a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure what I had to say was far more than a thousand words."

She looked at him, feeling unbelievable warmth inside of her. All of a sudden, she wanted to hear those thousand-plus words. Desperately so. If only she could stop time for just a little… but she couldn't. Not really. "I'll tell you what: if one word is worth… well, one word, and one picture is worth a thousand of them, I'd say that an action – the right action – might just be worth a million."

He raised an eyebrow. "A million, you say?"

She nodded. "Is that enough?"

"I might be able to work with a million," he said, pretending not to be quite sure about it.

"Good. So, if that's the case I'd say you could just… act away – we can worry about er… translating the actions later."

His lips curled. "You are something else, Isabelle Black."

"And you're on a countdown, George Weasley," she reminded him, gesturing towards Ginny who still stood with her back turned, hands clamped on her ears and apparently humming to herself the melody to the latest Weird Sisters single.

He seemed more than eager to make the time they had left worth their while, reaching to cup her face and leaning forwards almost immediately. He stopped right before touching her lips, though, making her groan. "One thing first," he said, polling away just a little and looking her in the eyes.

"George," she groaned in annoyance, almost in a threatening tone.

"It's quick. I just need to let you know, in case for some reason we're unable to collaborate efforts in this… translation, that when in doubt about the meaning of something…always go positive. You can't get it wrong that way."

"What?"

He quieted with the long-expected kiss. She melted into it almost immediately and, although later she'd be weighing his words like mad, at the moment she was content with experiencing the blissful oblivion of his lips.

It seemed each time they kissed, they got less and less restrained in showing their feelings. They were basically out there, gloriously obvious to one another, so who were they fooling? Truth was, like Ginny had said, they could all be dead in the morning, so they might as well live a little while they could.

Although those few minutes they'd had left after sharing words had certainly felt like much longer in their heads, they were still not enough at the same time. Too soon, Ginny's voice was vaguely sounding in the room.

"Is it safe to turn back?" she was asking, a little too loudly, due to the fact that she was still covering her ears.

For a moment of defiance, they allowed themselves to ignore her. It didn't work.

"Oi! I'm giving you a fair warning that I'll be turning around in ten seconds. You'd better not still be smacking li… shaking hands, I mean, or else I might just regret making this deal," Ginny warned them. "Turning in 8… 7… 6…"

They pulled apart at number 4 with matching annoyed groans and, by the time Ginny reached the 0 mark and turned around, Izzy was trying to untangle her now-messy hair and George was sitting around, slightly frustrated. Ginny ignored both signs of their not-so-real-handshaking and went right into business. "So, where did Fred go? One would think you two would be attached at the hip tonight of all nights."

"We were. But Kingsley assigned us to unblocking the secret passages of the castle for the Order to use and, since doing it together was just taking too long, we had to split up. We're supposed to meet up in the one behind the Lady of the Lake's tapestry on the fourth floor in…" he paused, checking his watch "… fifteen minutes."

"Have you finished your share of secret passages already?" Izzy asked.

He nodded. "Some of them are not perfect, but you can get through all of them if you're willing to get a little dirty. They really did a number on some… Anyway, I was thinking the two of you might come along and stick with us for the rest of the battle." He turned to Ginny. "Mum's already cross that we brought you along – it might calm her a little if she knew we weren't just letting you run around on your own."

"For the last time, I wasn't on my own!"

"Might as well be."

"Hey!" Izzy protested.

"I don't mean it like that, Isabelle. I mean that you were two girls on your own just a handful of yards away from seven Death Eaters probably looking for blood. Honestly, even with the three of us, once we leave this room, we're going to be in a pickle if they're still out there."

"Or if they decide to go check every classroom for students hiding," Ginny filled in. "We should really go. This place is a ticking time-bomb."

George nodded and they moved to the door. Izzy removed her previous locking charm before the others had a chance to try the door and reached to open it. George stopped her.

"Let me check what's going on outside first."

"_I_ can check," she replied, narrowing her eyes.

"You could lose your head," he said.

"So could you. And I'd rather you didn't – I've gotten rather attached to your head. Parts of it, at least," she informed him, a little tartly.

"Well, same goes to you, so I guess we've reached an impasse."

Ginny groaned loudly. "For the love of Merlin, just quit flirting and get out of the way!" And, for good measure, she pushed the two of them away – not-so-coincidently on opposite directions – and went for the door.

She opened it just enough for her head to fit and poked it out for about two seconds. When she closed back the door, she looked pale as a sheet.

"They're coming this way. Just around the corner. I could see their shadows," she told them, making the other two go as pale as she was.

"All seven?" George asked.

"Sounded like it," she confirmed. "There's no way they won't see us."

George bit his lip for a moment. "Well, we've got two choices: either we barricade ourselves in here and pray for a miracle or we go out and run for our lives. Hopefully we'll run into someone from our side that'll help us get rid of them."

Ginny and Izzy looked at each other – it took them about a second to decide. "We run. Staying here is useless."

George nodded. "I'll cause a fuss first – buy us some time. When I say 'now', we all go."

The girls nodded and so George opened the door slowly. Silently, he reached for something in his pocket – some sort of new and improved portable swamp, much smaller than the ones they'd seen before – and pointed his wand at it, casting a silent spell before stepping out of the door and throwing it the Death Eater's way.

They heard a strange sound – a bit of an explosion mixed with the sound of liquid flowing and Death Eaters shouting – and, just as the swampy stink reached their noses, George grabbed one hand from each and said the key-word. Immediately, all three of them started running in the opposite direction.

Izzy knew they'd gotten a decent head start when she didn't heard the Death Eaters following after them until about twenty seconds after they'd started running. The safe distance they'd gained did its job in messing with their aim, judging from the occasional flash of light missing them by more than anyone would be proud of. The first couple of spells had been the dreaded bright green, but the subsequent ones became red instead. Stunners, she thought. She wasn't sure if it was somehow related to the blaring she'd heard behind – orders being shouted, maybe.

They must've run for yards and yards – she vaguely recalled there being wide hallways, narrower ones, stairs, a tunnel somewhere… she wasn't even sure where she was anymore. She trusted George did, though. He knew every hall in that castle like the back of his hand.

They passed a few people on the way but they were mostly too busy with their own duels to care about somebody else's. And then, they were once again in a heavily-windowed hall she vaguely recognized. It was in the second floor, overlooking the transfiguration courtyard, which was oddly illuminated for some reason… like something was burning out there. And right outside, partially blocking the light, there was a huge shadow – a huge shadow that seemed to be moving…

Everything happened pretty fast after that realization. One moment she was running, her hand still firmly connected to George's, the next they were being pushed apart by a window exploding all of a sudden… no, not exploding. Being broken by a massive hand that had just burst through it.

It appeared roughly as wide as she was tall, no doubt connected to an equally huge Giant outside, and it moved around, grasping as if trying to catch something or, in that case, someone. In fact, it very nearly grabbed a handful of Ginny, who'd gotten somewhat disoriented by the exploding window, though she didn't seem particularly injured – the one thing that stopped it from grabbing her was George making a run for his sister and throwing some sort of spell at the hand, which seemed to do little more than tickle it but was just enough to buy him enough time so he could push her out of its path. Annoyed, the Giant pushed his arm further in, nearly elbow deep, definitely blocking passage from one end of the hallway to the other.

It was only when George was already splattered on the floor, one arm around Ginny's waist, that they realized what had just happened: on one side of the hand there were George and Ginny, marginally safe due to the blockage caused by the Giant's roaming hand, and on the other, there was Izzy, seconds away from being reached by the Death Eaters. Crossing to the other side of the hand wasn't an option as there simply wasn't time to try and immobilize it or push it out of the way. Her only escape left was a corridor that met the one she was in about ten yards behind her. Ten precious yards of distance she'd have to give up between herself and the Death Eaters in order to escape.

"It's okay," she told George and Ginny, who were staring in absolute horror at her. "Take care of yourselves. I'll be fine."

"Isabelle!" George yelled after her, but she didn't turn. She was already running.

She vaguely heard him and Ginny throwing curses and hexes behind her, maybe trying to hold the Death Eaters off a little longer, but it didn't seem to do much, likely due to the huge hand on the way, as she could hear them running much closer than before behind her.

Escaping the spells thrown her way became much harder. She had to run in zigzags, which closed the distance even more and every once in a while throw a shielding charm behind her, which would last just seconds at a time. To put it simple, she was doomed.

At least they didn't seem to be trying to kill her on sight anymore – they probably wanted to take her instead. Maybe use her as a bargaining chip later on… or maybe make some sort of spectacle of her killing by doing it in front of everyone. So, there it was again…

Should she simply expect to be killed and be pleasantly surprised if she wasn't? Funny thought, that was. She guessed she should simply accept that one couldn't always be as lucky as she'd been last time she'd ran for her life. She'd been saved that time. She'd gotten to snog George… well, she'd gotten to snog him that day too. That had been something. She only regretted not having said it: those three words. Blast the long, 'defining the relationship' talk – at least those three words were quick to be said and quick to be understood.

She was pretty sure George has said them, in his own way with that whole 'always go positive when in doubt' ramble. He had to know what the most obvious doubt in the book was… he had to know he'd basically given her free reign to assume the answer was 'yes' if the question 'Does he love me?' crossed her mind. Or maybe not. She didn't care: her life was hanging by a thread, so she was allowed to assume, even if she really wasn't.

The Death Eaters were mere feet away when she turned the next corner and she was sure she was done… until she wasn't. At the end of the new hall she found herself in, familiar faces were visible: Kingsley and Hestia and… darkness.

Just darkness…

And then light again. Light and white noise. And voices. And a headache, only eased by something cold pressing against her forehead.

"… _coming around. Izzy? Izzy, can you hear me_?" a familiar voice said.

Her eyelids were heavy and there was just too much light when she opened them, just barely, so she closed them again with a groan.

"_No, don't go back to sleep. Don't you dare, Isabelle Kathleen Black. You're already in a lot of trouble as it is_." It was her mother. She sounded worried and angry at the same time. That wasn't good. That wasn't good at all. Especially judging the use of her full name. Maybe she could just get to sleep a little longer… "_Izzy, don't. You've got a concussion. You need to stay awake_."

Well, that explained the headache.

"_Maybe she needs an incentive_," her father's voice said. He didn't sound amused. Not even in a jokingly serious way. That felt just… wrong. "_Say… an extra week grounded for every second she insists on keeping her eyes closed. Let me see… here goes one… two_."

She opened her eyes and, boy, was she right about her early assessment of her father's moon. He looked furious. Livid. She'd never, _ever _seen him looking so furious before. And the fact that he was so clearly furious at her made her feel sick of the stomach… then again, it might be the concussion.

"How many do you see?" her mother asked, holding up two fingers in front of her.

"Er… two?" she replied. "Can I…? Can I sit up? The lights are blinding me down here."

"Yes, but hold the ice in place," Mia instructed. She was in full-healer mode, Izzy noted as she did as she was told. She had a feeling that wasn't good – it seemed like a way to restrain the rage or something. "Can you remember the date today?"

"The first of May… no, the second. It's past midnight."

Mia nodded. "And do you remember what happened? Before you lost consciousness?"

It was a bit fuzzy at first. "I was running?" she said, phrasing it like a question. "Did I get stunned?"

"Yes. And then you hit your head. Kingsley and Hestia brought you. You were out for a few minutes even after we removed the stunner," her mother told her.

"I have a question of my own," Sirius announced in his edging-on-furious tone. "Can you remember what the hell possessed you to come here today?!"

Izzy didn't respond. She just looked down at her hands in silence.

"What? No words now? Because I can tell you some words. I can tell you how I felt like when Kingsley Shacklebolt showed up with my unconscious daughter in his arms. My unconscious daughter who was supposed to be home, safe and asleep!" he shouted.

"Sirius…" Mia said in a warning tone. "She has a concussion."

"Well, she was fine enough to lay there pretending to still be unconscious when she smelled trouble for herself. I reckon she's also fine enough to hear about that trouble, then," he told his wife before turning to face his daughter again. "What the hell were you thinking?!"

She looked at him and pressed her lips together.

"Well?" he insisted.

Something in his tone made her not want to stay quiet. Like, if she did, she'd be taking all the blame what part of her felt like they were due their own share. "I was thinking how unsurprising it was that you left me behind! Without even a 'goodbye', mind you!"

"We left a note!"

Izzy glared. It wasn't until then that she realized just how… lacking it felt that they'd think a note served for a decent goodbye. Especially when they might not make it back! She'd been too busy planning her escape to think of that before. "A note! Good, a note! Why should I even worry if my parents are here risking their lives? If something happens to them, at least I'll always have _a note_!"

"Watch your tone, Izzy," her mother warned her as her father stalked over to the aisle in the centre of the room, pacing left and right as he fumed. She sighed. "Maybe you have a point and a note wasn't the best… farewell. But you still had no business coming here today and you know it. You're sixteen!"

"So was Harry when he was out with Dumbledore searching for Horcruxes. And so is Ginny, who is here today too. And Luna. And Merlin knows how many more students!"

"Not by their parents' choice, let me assure you. And Ginny, unlike you, is locked in the Room of Requirement. Safe."

"No. Ginny _was_ locked until Harry needed to use it and she had to come out. She was with me until about five minutes before I got knocked out. And now, she's out there somewhere with George and I should be with them."

Fire blazed in her mother's eyes. "You're not going anywhere, young lady. You've got a concussion. Do you have any idea how serious a head injury can be? The last thing you need is to go back out there and risk putting yourself in a coma or worse by getting knocked on the head again. So, mark my words: even if I have to restrain you myself, you're not stepping foot out of that door until I say so."

She wasn't kidding, Izzy could tell. Mum mode and healer mode mixed together served for an explosive cocktail.

"_And, by the way_," her father said, approaching the bed she was sitting on again still looking furious, though it seemed he'd vented a little during his long pacing moment, "in case it didn't stick to your head before, you're _grounded_. I'm grounding you and I'm going to enjoy every moment of it."

"Fine!" she replied, dumping the ice on her lap and crossing her arms, making an effort to show she didn't care.

"Fine!" he said in the exact same way, sounding far less mature than he'd been aiming for before he stalked his way to the door and went back to his post guarding the infirmary.

In the same way her father fumed at the door, Izzy moped as she lounged on her bed, watching as her mother went back to checking on the other patients. She kept eyeing the door, feeling the sting that was knowing she couldn't go out looking for Ginny and George in order to make sure they were okay. Her father would have her back on her bed sooner than she could say 'goodbye' in spoken form rather than written. And lying there, doing nothing, only made it all sting more.

"So, am I just supposed to lay here and do nothing?" she asked her mother when she came over to check on the bump on her head again.

"You have a concussion – you're not supposed to overdo it."

"Isn't there something to fix it? A potion or a spell… Or are you just keeping it from me so you'll have an excuse to keep me in bed?"

Mia glared. "Izzy, you know I'd never do that! To you or to anyone!" her mother said, making her feel a bit ashamed for suggesting it. "In a case like yours, where there doesn't seem to be bleeding or noticeable brain damage, it just has to heal on its own. The most I can do is give you something for the headache, which I have right here, by the way," she added, handing her a glass of blue liquid. "Now, drink up."

She did and it tasted like leftover water from someone's extensive dish-washing. It did, however, relieve some of the pressure on her head, resulting from the headache, almost immediately. "Can't I at least do something around here? Help something or other? I promise I won't go around banging my head on cupboards. And it's not like I can make a run for it with Dad at the door. It's just… laying here doing nothing is murder, Mum."

Mia took a breath. "Let the potion fully sink in. Then I'll see what I can do."

Izzy wasn't sure if her mother did mean it or if that was just her way of putting off the matter, hoping she'd forget it. Which she wouldn't, Izzy firmly told herself. And, apparently, neither did her mother – ten minutes later, she was back with an assignment for her.

"Go around the room and check which potions are running out," she said, gesturing towards the occupied bed's end tables and the main potion cupboard in the room. "When they are, get more of them. You can find more bottles in the boxes over there and don't guide yourself by their shape or the colour – just read the labels. Cutting corner can end up badly. And, for the love of Merlin, Izzy, if the headache gets worse, just stop and call for me. Things can get very bad very fast with a head injury."

"Okay, I will. I don't… I don't have a death-wish or anything," she told her mother, as she seemed to doubt it. She'd come there to help, not to die.

Mia gave her a look. "Well, you'd have us fooled, then."

Izzy didn't respond. She just got up and went to do what she was told. Being potion-girl didn't seem like a particularly exciting job, but it sure beat lying in bed, doing nothing. But, once she was done, roughly ten minutes after she'd started, she was, once again, feeling useless.

Then, some bloke she didn't recognized whose leg seemed twisted in a way it really wasn't supposed to was brought into the room and her mother, as well as Madam Pomfrey and all the nurses, got busy fixing him. Surprisingly enough, she soon heard her name being called by her mother, urging her to approach the bed the bloke was being fixed up on.

"We've got our hands full here, so we need you to go check on all the patients on the left-hand side beds. "They have head injuries, most worse than yours, so make sure they're all awake," her mother told her.

"Pay special attention to the girl in the third bed from the door," Madam Pomfrey instructed. "Her speech was a bit slurred: ask her name – it's Jenny McCarthy – and today's date. If she says gibberish, call for one us."

And so they kept her busy as they fixed up the bloke's leg, giving her more and more responsibility. It started with checking on patients, then moved to giving another dose of Skele-Gro to the bloke in the yellow robes ('_half a measuring cup, not a drop more!_'), then fetching them something to make a splint, then healing some cuts with dittany. It was fulfilling in a strange way: although every anguished scream that came from the bloke with the injured leg assured her more that she really needed to scratch 'healer' option out of her potential future career list, once her father ran into the room saying there was some commotion nearby he needed to check on, she didn't have the urge to sneak out or follow him, now that her mother was busy healing someone and her father wasn't really paying attention.

Apparently, there was some sort of big multiple-sided duel going on at the main staircase, Dedalus Diggle explained between gasps after Madam Pomfrey moved from the guy with the injured leg to him, in order to fix up the badly cut up arm Bill Weasley had brought him there with. It was all a big mess, according to him: spells flying everywhere, across the many floors the staircase covered; people unconscious all over it, both Death Eaters and fighters from their side.

Knowing that her father had needed to check on it, since the Hospital Wing wasn't all that far from there and there was the risk the duel moving on to there since the local wards were history, made her feel a lump on her throat. What if he got hurt in there? What if he… what if the last conversation she'd had with him had been a big fight?

She didn't need to wonder about that for long, though, as soon her father was back… and he didn't look well. Not because he was hurt. No. He looked awful because there was another really injured guy to beat the leg bloke out of the 'most banged up guy in the room' title. And, not only was that guy actually unconscious (_dead, maybe?_ she had to wonder), but he also had a familiar face. A very familiar face. It was Remus.

But he couldn't be dead, she told herself. He couldn't, because nearly all nurses, as well as her mother and Madam Pomfrey turned away from their current patients in order to gather around the bed someone had placed him on and work on him. No dead person could possibly steal so much attention from injured people. Not even Remus. He was still alive, if barely, and they were trying to save him.

"What happened?" Madam Pomfrey was shouting at her father.

"He fell! He just… fell!" her father said, like he couldn't believe it.

"Fell from where?"

"The seventh floor… all the way down the open well between the staircases. Merlin, how high is it up there? A hundred feet? It had to be at least a hundred feet! Is he still alive? He was when we got to him… do you think he'll make it?" her father rambled in a panic as he hovered by the team of healers and nurses.

"He's alive but you need to give us space, Sirius," her mother was saying without turning to him.

"He's got a kid. He's got a kid who probably won't remember him at all if he dies like this," her father said, immobile. "Merlin."

"Sirius, you need to move," her mother said again with no success. "Izzy!"

Izzy realized she hadn't moved at all since her father's return once her mother called her name. She also realized, even without her mother saying, that she was being called to get her father of their hair.

"Dad," she called for her father once she reached him, pulling on his arm. "Dad, come on. They're trying to help him. You'll get in the way."

Apparently, only that last statement got him to move. He was soon taking a few steps back, guided by her, and standing a reasonable distance away from the commotion, although he didn't tear his eyes away from it once. She tried to get him to sit down but he wouldn't go further than there.

"A hundred feet," he was mumbling in shock. "He fell a hundred feet."

"Maybe it wasn't that high," Izzy said. She had no idea how high the seventh floor was, to be honest – a hundred feet like he was saying, for all she knew. But he didn't need to think that. "You were watching from down here, right? Everything seems taller when you're watching from behind."

He didn't respond. She wasn't sure if he'd even heard. Still, she stood by her father's side, holding his hand, if only to make sure he wouldn't wander back to where he'd been standing before.

Her mother approached some time later, not to talk but apparently in search for something in the potions cupboard on their left.

"How is he?" her father asked as she messed around with the potions.

"He should be dead," Mia said without looking at him.

"What?!" he asked, unable to believe she was saying that.

"He should be dead. A _normal_ person would be dead," she specified, her eyes still fixed on the potions. "Izzy, the Punjab Drought – have you seen it? Isn't this supposed to be on alphabetic order?"

"It _is_. You're searching on D," Izzy told her. Her mother was clearly too agitated by the situation to properly look. "Give me a second. I'll get it for you."

Mia nodded and her daughter was off to another cupboard.

In the meanwhile, Sirius frowned. "A normal person? You mean that because he's a werewolf…"

"…he's still alive? Yes. I think so," she confirmed, finally looking at him. "You said he fell like a hundred feet. A hundred feet! He should be dead. He should be completely torn apart, at the very least. But fact is, his spine's not even severed and that's just not possible for a human being. Not on a free-fall."

"So, you think he's going to live."

"I think he should be dead and he's not," she corrected him, careful not to give him too much hope when there was still a long way before Remus was out of the woods. It crushed him, though – she could see it in his eyes and, as his wife, she couldn't just leave it there. "That's a good thing, Sirius."

And that was all she could offer, as Izzy was suddenly back with about half a dozen bottles of the same liquid, saying she hadn't been sure how many were needed. Mia took two and walked back to the bed Remus was on, leaving her daughter to put the rest away.

"You really should sit, Dad," Izzy insisted for the second time, not really expecting him to give in. "Standing here won't help anyone, least of all Remus."

That time, maybe because of her mother's soft reassurance, when she pulled on his arm, he came after. They sat on a row of chairs at the entrance and waited. Just waited in silence… she wasn't sure for how long.

When her father spoke again, she was a bit startled to hear it, having gotten used to the silence on his part. "This is what happens in a battle, Izzy," he mumbled. "People get hurt, sometimes beyond repair. People get killed. Hearts get broken. Bad stuff happens and this should be no news to you. So why on Earth would you rather be here than at home, safe with your brother and sister?"

She eyed him for a few moments before responding. He didn't sound like he was lecturing her anymore. He just sounded… tired. A little broken from the prospect of maybe losing the last best friend he had left… to be left the only Marauder alive. Terribly lonely in his own club.

Just thinking of it made her heart break a little, so, as if trying to reassure him he was not alone, she wrapped her arms around her father, resting her head against his shoulder. Only then did she answer. "My family was here, Dad. How could I stay away when nearly everyone I love in this world was right here risking their lives?"

Sirius didn't respond to that. He was sure nothing would ever erase that image of Kingsley carrying his daughter unconscious… dead, for all he'd know. But, at the same time, now that she'd spoken her reasons, although he still didn't approve, mostly because it was his daughter and he'd be okay with her being in danger, he could see himself feeling exactly the same thing if the roles were reversed. So, with a sigh, he wrapped one arm around her back, bringing her closer.

"You're still grounded," he reminded her half-heartedly, his main thoughts focused on his best friend's recovery.

"That's okay," Izzy replied. And it was. If he enforced her grounding that would mean they were both alive. So, she hoped he did. "He'll be fine, Dad. And you'll laugh about this one day: the night Remus Lupin was lucky he was a werewolf."

He kissed the top of his daughter's head silently. He hoped she was right.

**A/N: To be continued... Feedback is welcome! Review!**


	64. The Final Battle pt 2

**A/N: And here is the final battle and the final chapter to this fic (excluding the epilogue, which will follow soon). **

**Also, some of you may have heard I have been plagiarized by someone in this site, who used large chunks of my fics, altering very little of it, mostly just names. The author has contacted me and apologized personally and I have decided to put it past me. The stories in question have been deleted and that's the end of it for me. Still, I'd like to thank every one of you who sent me supporting messages – you got me through that massive blow.**

**Now, on to the chapter. Enjoy!**

Inside the Hospital Wing, Sirius and Izzy heard her calls all the way from the end of the hall even before they saw her. Once they got up from where they'd been sitting and walked over to the door, they saw as Nymphadora Tonks ran in their direction as fast as her feet would allow her, her eyes as red-rimmed as anyone's eyes could possibly get and her hair, which had been pink last time Izzy had seen it, back to the dull brown it always showed whenever something worrisome was going on. Clearly, she knew something was wrong with her husband.

"_Remus!_" she was calling.

The metamorphagus reached them in a matter of seconds but didn't seem to register their presence in the least: the one thing she would have possibly cared about seeing right then and there would have been her husband. Such was, that she'd have burst straight into the Hospital Wing if Sirius hadn't caught her by the waist first, blocking her way.

"Let me go, I need to see him!" she yelled, struggling against his hold.

"Tonks, they're working. You can't just barge in there freaking out like this," Sirius told her. It disturbed him a little that, even though he still felt completely messed up, Tonks was so much worse that he actually had to call her to reason. Hadn't he been the one who, twenty minutes before, had to be talked into getting out of the way?

His best mate's wife, however, stopped struggling much faster than he's predicted, suddenly turning from the flailing mess she'd been seconds before into a nearly-limp version of herself. "He's really dead, isn't he?" she asked, her voice so empty it felt like a punch to the face.

It hurt so much to hear that Sirius had to look at his daughter for support. Izzy shook her head, reminding him that wasn't the truth. "No, Tonks, he's not," he replied

But she wasn't listening. "They told me he fell from so high…" she said, tears running down her face. "I should have tried harder to find him! The prat thought he could just leave me home and come here alone. He just had to get himself killed! We were supposed to come together and protect each other!" She somehow sounded furious and inconsolable at the same time.

"Tonks, he's _not_ dead," Sirius told her once again.

Like last time, his words came and went without her actually registering a single letter. "Merlin, what am I supposed to do without that stupid, selfless arse?! What am I supposed to do about Teddy? He's so little… how can I tell him his Dad is gone?"

"He's not gone!" Sirius said one more time, that once actually grabbing his cousin's shoulders and making her look at him. "Will you listen to what I tell you, for the love of Merlin?! Remus is not dead! He's not fine but he's still alive, so stop acting like he's not!"

If he had any doubt she'd actually managed to convince herself that Remus was dead up until then, the look of incredulity on her face after she finally allowed herself to hear those words certainly cleared it. "He fell from the seventh floor," she said in a small voice. "Dawlish said Dolohov sent him flying over the railing. He said he was dead."

"Dawlish is a moron and everyone knows it," Sirius told her. "Moony's alive and, Merlin help me, he'd better stay that way or we're going to have a big problem, me and him."

She pursed her lips together hard, trying to will her tears to stop. "I want to see him," she said.

"Let Izzy check in first," he told her, knowing from experience she'd be no good to his friend the state she was in. He glanced at his daughter and she nodded, making her way back into the infirmary and heading to Remus's bedside.

"How bad is he?" Tonks managed to ask when the two of them were left alone

"Not nearly as bad as he should have been," he told her in the same way Mia had told him earlier. "And it's Greyback we have to thank for that, I suppose."

Tonks's red-rimmed eyes seemed confused as she eyed him.

"His furry little problem. He's made of more durable stuff than any of us are because of it," Sirius explained. "He's going to love the irony."

The metamorphagus pursed her lips again, trying to keep the tears away as she wished he'd have a chance to.

Izzy walked back out of the room a few seconds later, holding a spoon full of some liquid and an apologetic look on her face. "Madam Pomfrey says you can only come in if you take this," she said, nodding at the spoon. "It's just a little bit of calming drought."

"Calming drought?! I don't need any calming drought!" Tonks shouted, not at Izzy but at Madam Pomfrey herself, even though she couldn't even get a glimpse of the matron through the doorway.

The older woman clearly heard her, nonetheless. "_Nymphadora Tonks, don't you make me walk away from your husband who actually needs me and go over there to shove it down your throat!_" the matron yelled back from inside, with her usual non-nonsense attitude, especially saved for regular patients as Tonks had been herself. "_We're going to need you in a few minutes and you're no use to us panicking!_"

"I'm not panicking!" Tonks yelled back. "I just want to see my husband!"

"_Then why are you fighting about taking the damn thing?! It won't do any harm!_"

Tonks went quiet at that, realizing the woman had a point. She was wasting time on a pointless battle against something that might actually help.

"Sorry," Izzy apologized, as she handed her the spoon.

The metamorphagus didn't reply. She accepted the spoon, downed it quickly and handed it back to Izzy, promptly marching past Sirius, headed to her husband's bedside.

Sirius and Izzy couldn't help following her into the room themselves, although they stood farther away from the bed than she did, reminded of the argument from before. Still, from where he stood Sirius was relieved to note than his friend seemed considerably less bloody than before, even though he was aware that the most serious damage was likely not on the surface. Yet, only Mia and Madam Pomfrey remained by his friend's bedside, the nurses having gone back to check on the other patients, which he supposed was a sign that they had things under control.

"Remus? Remus, talk to me. Remus!" Tonks demanded from her husband, her voice shaking as she did so.

"I don't think that's going to work, Miss Tonks. He's quite out of it," Madam Pomfrey said, still addressing Tonks the same way she had during her Hogwarts years. "A bit of a blessing. He'd be fairly uncomfortable if he was conscious right now."

"But he'll wake up, right?" she asked, frantically. "He'll be okay. He has to be okay. He has to wake up!"

"We're confident he will, Tonks, but it's just too early to tell for sure," Mia said, placing a hand on her shoulder.

"Then do something to make sure!"

"We have done all we could, Ms Tonks," Madam Pomfrey told her. "We've cast every spell, given him every potion we could possibly give him with the resources and the information we have. But he needs more tests and more potions that we just can't provide in a school infirmary."

"Then what? He just has to do without? We cross our fingers and hope for the best?!" the metamorphagus asked, incredulous to the point of near-hysteria.

"Of course not – he needs to be moved to St Mungo's," the matron declared. "And that's where you come, Ms Tonks."

"But how? Apparition is blocked. And it's a slaughter out there! How can I possibly carry him all the way to the Room of Requirement or to the gates without getting both of us killed?"

"There are a couple of secret passages you can take – they've been fairly safe so far," Mia explained. "We can get someone to guide you through…"

"I'll do it," Sirius offered immediately, taking a step closer.

Mia nodded, not wavering for a second. It was his best-friend lying there half-dead and desperately needing help – or course Sirius would step in. "Sirius will take you there. Right now Remus is stable enough to be moved, so we just need to cast a few immobilizing charms and you're good to go. I'm sorry we can't do more right now, Tonks, but if we try to go too far without being completely sure of what the full extent of the damage is exactly, we could make him worse than he already is."

Tonks nodded numbly in response, the calming drought just starting to kick in, and held on to her unconscious husband's limp hand as she let Madam Pomfrey get to work with the immobilizing charms.

Mia, on the other hand, took Sirius aside in order to brief him on what kind of precautions he should have while moving his friend. She'd barely gone past instructing him on what sort of levitation charm he should use to transport Remus when a voice other than hers – a voice they really would rather not hear – not only sounded in the room but also through the entire castle. Voldemort's.

Everyone went quiet at that, even the patients that had been moaning in pain in the background.

"_You have fought valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery,_" he started, to everyone's disbelief. For a moment, they had to wonder if he was referring to his Death Eaters or just mocking everyone else. The latter option seemed to be the most likely when he went on about how they'd sustained heavy losses that would only get heavier if they continued to resist him. Then, he had the gall to say that every drop of magical blood spilled – by him, no less – was a waste, promptly branding himself some sort of magnanimous soul by commanding his troops to retreat so they could have an hour to dispose of the dead and treat the injured.

And then, he started speaking to Harry directly. "_You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences_."

The threats continued after that – something about punishing everyone who protected him after said hour, regardless of gender or age – but none of them was really listening anymore.

"That son of a…" Sirius mumbled under his breath.

"Harry won't do it," Izzy said, more to convince herself than anything else. "He's smarter than that. We're already traitors in You-Know-Who's eyes. Harry has to know that even if he gives himself over, there's no way he'll let us get away with helping him."

No one responded to that, although they all hoped she was right.

"Miss Black, another dose of Skele-Gro to Mr Jones, please?" Madam Pomfrey broke through the silence. "Same measure as before."

Izzy frowned, feeling like the task was just a way to dismiss her, but did it anyway.

Mia sighed where she stood. "Where was I?" she asked Sirius, trying not to think of Voldemort's words.

"Levitation charms. But, look, I've got it: don't lose focus on the charm, be careful not to let him bump into anything, send a Patronus is something happens… It'll be okay."

She took a breath. "Alright. I'm going to write down a list of the potions we gave him. Give it to the healers there just as soon as you can. And another thing," she added. "Don't leave Tonks alone. Contact her mother or… anyone, really. Just make sure she doesn't stay there alone even if you have to stay there yourself or else she'll lose it."

"She seems calmer now," Sirius argued. "What with the calming draught…"

"She didn't have that much of it, Sirius. Calming drought can only do so much without clouding judgment and we didn't want that," she explained. "The fact is that when she sees herself in that hospital on her own with her husband fighting for his life, as long as she's awake she'll feel anything but calm, no matter how many potions we feed her. Merlin knows I would."

Sirius sighed. "But are you sure you'll be okay here on your own with Izzy?"

She nodded. "We'll be fine. We've got an hour – you heard it."

"For some reason, I can't quite fully trust the words out of a psychopath's mouth," he said, dryly.

"You'll have to this time. Look, Izzy and I are fine – Tonks is not and Remus even less. Hold the fort with them over there, I'll hold this one over here. We're a team, remember?"

He let out a long breath and replied with a nod. "Just tell me straight – does he have a good chance?"

Mia sighed. "If he gets to the hospital in time… if they have the right resources there… if they all they're supposed to… he might. I'm sorry. That's all I can give you now."

Sirius let out a breath. "I suppose it's better than nothing."

"It is," she agreed. "I have to go write that list down now while Poppy finishes immobilizing Remus."

Her husband nodded and, the moment she was gone, he moved over to Izzy, who was already putting the Skele-Gro away. "Don't even think of trying to sneak away from your mum," he warned her.

"I could've snuck away a dozen times in the past half-hour while you were distracted and I didn't," she replied. "Give me some credit."

"It's a little too soon for you to be asking that, don't you think?" he pointed out. "Just keep in mind that I don't care about having a hero for a daughter today. But I need a living one. So…"

"Dad, I'll try not to get myself killed," she said. "I promise."

"Good. I won't forget that," he replied before taking a breath and leaning forward to place a kiss on top of her head. "Thank you."

"What for?" she asked, genuinely confused by his gratefulness.

"Keeping it together when I couldn't," he specified.

"_Sirius, he's ready_," they heard Mia calling from nearby, prompting Sirius to walk over to her and his friends.

There was little time for goodbyes and good lucks before they had to leave, yet Madam Pomfrey herself took the time to reassure a very shaken Tonks that, even though her husband was nowhere near 'well', he still could be in much worse shape. On the background of that short conversation, Mia handed her husband a few notes to pass on to the healer and, after placing a little kiss on her lips and begging her to be careful, Sirius was off, followed by Tonks and an unconscious Remus, floating a few feet above the floor on a levitated stretcher.

They hadn't been gone for thirty seconds and already the sound of running steps sounded outside – half-expecting it to be Tonks or Sirius returning to get them because of Remus taking a sudden turn for the worst, Mia rushed to the door immediately with Madam Pomfrey following close behind, having just delegated what she was doing on a nurse. But, turned out, it wasn't Sirius or Tonks – it was Dean Thomas.

"Madam Pomfrey… Professor," the boy said, trying to catch his breath from all the running.

"Mr Thomas, are you alright?" Pomfrey asked.

He nodded. "They need you downstairs. In the Great Hall. They're gathering the injured down there – there are just too many to move this far."

"The Great Hall? Is there anyone there helping them?"

Once again, the boy responded with a nod. "There's a healer and a few volunteers. But they're shorthanded. She asked me to find someone with healer training – I figured I might find that here. Oh, and she asked to say they need supplies. Lots of supplies."

"And by 'she' you mean…" Madam Pomfrey prompted.

"The healer. I think her name is Harvey or Harmon…"

"Harper? Elizabeth Harper?" Mia asked.

He nodded. "Could be – there was too much happening at the same time. Sorry."

Madam Pomfrey shook her head. "Alright. Run back and tell Ms Harper or whoever the healer is that we're sending someone right down with supplies, then find some volunteers to help move the worst of the injured to St. Mungo's – we'll send a couple of aurors down to set up the whole thing. Now, off with you, Mr Thomas."

The moment Dean was gone, Madam Pomfrey turned to Izzy, who stood suspiciously close, trying to look like she was trying to mind her own business. "Miss Black, let's not play coy. I assume you heard everything, so you know what to do."

"Hum… gather supplies?" she asked, slightly embarrassed for having been called out on her eavesdropping.

"Ask Anna for help," the woman said with a nod before turning back to Mia. "I'm afraid we'll have to split now. There may be plenty of injured down there but the ones up here still need attention."

Mia nodded. "I suppose it makes sense that I go – this is your turf. You know how to get around here best," she said, even though she had to glance at her daughter, unsure of what to do about her.

"Take her," Pomfrey said, as if she was reading her thoughts.

Mia turned to her suddenly. "Izzy? You think it's safe?"

"This entire school is a battlefield – nothing and nowhere is safe here. But the girl is clearly doing well and keeping her busy is good for her. Besides, Merlin knows you won't trust anyone but yourself to keep her under control."

The matron had a point there, Mia had to admit. "I suppose keeping her near me wouldn't hurt."

Pomfrey nodded in approval. "I'll spare you Anna and the other nurse girl. I think Mrs Podmore and myself can keep this wing under control." She left to go help Izzy and the nurses with their task.

Sighing, Mia joined them too, helping her daughter filling up the supply bag she was currently in charge of. Once they were done, she stopped Izzy just as she was about to carry it to a pile they were making near the door

"Stand still for a moment," she instructed before using her wand as a torch and waving it around in front of Izzy's eyes, testing her reflexes. She then stopped and lifted four fingers in front of her daughter's face. "How many?"

"Four. Mum, you've done this before. I'm fine," Izzy reminded her.

"I need to make sure the concussion hasn't worsened. How is your headache?" Mia asked.

"It feels like it's almost gone – I think it's the potion."

"Any vertigo when you're walking?"

When she shook her head, her mother stopped, then and sighed. "Alright, then. Take this bag and come with me. We're going to the Great Hall."

Izzy raised her eyebrows. "Wait, you're letting me get out of here?"

"I'm not letting you out of my sight for a minute tonight if I can help it. Merlin knows the trouble you'll get into the moment I'll turn my back. Now come along, Izzy."

She gladly did. The nurses followed them out, each one of them carrying a bag, as well as the two aurors who'd been in charge of moving the injured to St. Mungo's.

It was a whole new world outside of that little safe haven in the Hospital Wing – that was particularly noticeable once they reached the Entrance Hall. Even as she followed her mother, who was already a few yards ahead, entering the Great Hall with the nurses and aurors, Izzy's eyes didn't stop roaming around to see all the destruction. People injured in corners, dead bodies being carried, big chunks of stone from the walls and ceilings covering the floor. It was horrifying, yet she still couldn't look away.

"Izzy!" she heard a familiar voice calling from behind her.

Turning around, Izzy caught a glimpse of flowing blond hair before feeling herself being engulfed in a bone-crushing hug. "Luna," she said in recognition.

"It's been such a long time," the girl said as she pulled away, sounding as if she'd been on holiday, rather than serving as a hostage in the Malfoy Manor.

"It has," was all Izzy could say at first as she put the bag down on the floor. "Luna… I'm so sorry. I should have noticed you were gone sooner. We all just assumed you'd gone with your Dad…"

Luan shook her head. "It wasn't your fault. They'd have taken me anyway," she said. "I heard they tried to get you and your mother too at Easter."

"Yeah… we escaped before they could, though. Listen, they didn't hurt you, did they?" She felt stupid right after asking that – they probably had, one way or the other.

The blonde shook her head, though, either because she was being truthful or feeding her a kind lie. "It was quite uncomfortable, though… all those Nargles. Mr Ollivander had the most the most interesting stories, though…"

"_Izzy_," they heard her mother calling, suddenly reminding Izzy she was supposed to have been following her into the Great Hall.

She turned around immediately, only to spot her mum making her way back to her, presumably to scold her for falling behind. "I'm sorry," she apologized before her mother had a chance to lecture her. "I got distracted and then I ran into Luna…"

"It's alright, honey, I just wanted to see where you were," Mia told her. She smiled at Luna but there was something missing in that smile. Odd. "It's good to see you doing alright, Luna."

Luna smiled back. "You too, Professor."

"I'll be right in with you," Izzy told her mother, already reaching down for the bag of supplies.

Mia reached for it instead, though. "No need to rush – I can take that myself. Why don't you take five minutes to catch up with Luna and then come meet me?"

What?! Izzy thought, looking at her mother very oddly. "I thought you didn't want me out of your sight."

"It's five minutes. I'm allowing myself to trust you for five minutes," Mia said. There was something strange in her voice – she was speaking faster than usual. Just a little, but enough for Izzy to notice.

"Is everything okay?"

"You haven't seen Luna in a while, Izzy. I know you'd want to catch up and I'd rather you did it while there are no Death Eaters around."

Izzy still suspected her mother was acting out of character, but the few minutes of freedom did sound like too nice a prospect to refuse. "Five minutes, then?"

"Yes," Mia replied, her voice strangely feeble before she rushed back into the Great Hall.

"That was odd," Luna commented.

"I know. It's like she wanted me out of her hair…" Izzy agreed.

"_Oi! We could use a hand here_," they heard another familiar voice saying from behind her.

The two girls turned around only to spot the owner of the voice, Neville, making his way down the main staircase with Hannah Abbot as the two of them supported a clearly injured Seamus, who struggled to walk on a rather bloody leg.

"Can we stop for a second?" Hannah asked. "He's starting to falter."

"Oi! Are you calling me feeble?" the Irish boy protested through the pain as Neville helped him lower down to sit on one of the steps.

"You've seen better days," Neville commented before turning to the girls. "I didn't think you'd come after what happened at Easter and all," he told Izzy.

"Come on, I couldn't miss the party, could I?"

"And what a party…" Neville commented.

She chuckled and crouched down, turning her attention to Seamus. "What've you got there, Seamus?"

"Oh, you know," he mumbled in a pained tone. "Got nicked by a cutting charm. It could've been much worse. But I guess if this doesn't kill me, it'll leave a nice scar. You girls fancy that kind of thing, right?"

"Don't be stupid, Seamus, you're going to be fine!" Hannah scolded him.

"Hannah's right. My mum has some dittany with her. She can probably heal that leg for you in a tick. Do you think you can get to the Great Hall after you catch your breath or should I get someone for you?"

"I got this far, didn't I?" he told her. "Nev, gimme a hand."

Neville nodded and promptly wrapped one arm around his friend, helping him up onto his good leg. Luna lent a hand as well and so she and Neville supported the Irish boy, Hannah following right behind.

Izzy led the way into the Great Hall, which was the pinnacle of all horror. She had to avert her eyes from the corner where line after line of dead bodies remained. On the opposite side, there were the injured. She recognised her mother's best friend, Elizabeth, running around, patching them up as well as she could manage but they outnumbered her by a lot. Izzy was surprised to note her mother hadn't joined her. Where was she?

Another painful look at the side with all the dead, and she found her standing next to some of the Weasleys, talking to a red-eyed Fleur. It didn't register why they were at first: once she spotted Ginny, she found herself bundled with relief. And then she realized Ginny has tears on her face too. She was crying – Ginny never cried.

Suddenly, she was searching for George among them, but he was gone. He wasn't the only one: Bill was missing too and so was Charlie. Percy was surprisingly there, a little out of place in her book, though he seemed to be as lost in his sobbing as the rest of his family.

And then she noticed what they were gathered around… who. It was one of the twins and she just couldn't tell which one. She couldn't tell and she needed to because they weren't helping him – they were just crying. And she knew what that meant. Death. The Weasley on the floor – Fred or George – was dead and the moment that sunk into her, it was like all air was sucked out of her lungs. She couldn't think. She couldn't move.

Her mother spotted her almost immediately and was running to her. Suddenly, it made sense. "This is why you wanted me out," Izzy mumbled in a detached sort of way.

"I needed to know,Izzy. It's not him," her mother said, wrapping her arms around her. She'd thanked all the gods ever to be worshiped that Izzy had fallen behind when she'd first seen it. She'd known right there and then that she couldn't let her see it, not without knowing beforehand if the boy lying dead on the floor was the one her daughter had spent the past few months pining for. Not without knowing if her heart would get broken so badly when she was still so young. "It's not George, love. It's still awful but… it's not your George, sweetheart."

All of a sudden, Izzy felt like the most horrible person in the world. It wasn't George and she was relieved. She was relieved because it was Fred dead and that was just a horrible thing to feel. She hated herself for feeling it, because poor Fred was dead and didn't deserve her feeling that way about it. She especially felt horrible because she knew it would crush George. Merlin, it would break him so bad… and she was _relieved!_ What the hell was wrong with her?! She felt like crying for that fact alone.

"Are you okay, sweetheart?" her mother asked her when she let go.

Izzy didn't respond. She just pointed behind her numbly. "Seamus's leg," she mumbled.

Mia looked over and nodded. "Yes, I'll take care of it. But are you alright?"

She nodded, even though she didn't mean it. She didn't want to be consoled. How could anyone console her when she was the girl who was relieved that the twin brother and best friend of the bloke she was in love with was dead? "I need to go. Ginny…"

Mia nodded and allowed her to walk away, towards her best friend.

"Ginny," she whispered.

The redheaded didn't move. She just stood there, staring at her dead brother like she was just waiting for him to rise up and laugh over having thrown the mother of all pranks. But he wouldn't. And so, Ginny Weasley who didn't cry, Ginny Weasley who was one of the bravest people she knew, Ginny Weasley who'd just lost one of her favourite brothers, stood there, immobile, with silent tears rolling down her face.

Izzy wasn't sure what to do, so she just stood there with her friend, placing one hand on her shoulder. Still, Ginny didn't move or sob, or sniff, contrasting heavily with her mother, who cried and begged loudly. And so, unable to leave her friend's side in that moment of grief, Izzy did the same.

As much as she willed her eyes to move away, they wouldn't – they remained morbidly fixed on Fred's body, painfully reminding her of what a horrible person she was that she'd been relieved that boy – that boy who'd been nothing but a good friend to her and her family – was the one dead, rather than his twin brother.

"I tried to prepare myself for this." Ginny's voice was low and distant as she said those words. "You can never really prepare yourself but I tried. I really did. Because there are nine of us – nine – and odds are just stacked against you when there are so many. So, I told myself it could happen and I shouldn't be completely shocked by it."

"It doesn't work that way," Izzy told her.

"I know. I know it doesn't. But the thing is: I never prepared myself for _this_. For _one_ of them to die. Just _one_. Because they were never one – they were always two. They were different but they were always two," Ginny mumbled before turning to Izzy. "So, how can there be just one now? How can there be a George without a Fred?"

It went straight to the heart, Ginny's question. How could there be a George without a Fred? "Where is he? George, I mean," she heard herself asking.

Ginny shook her head. "He was here before. We came here together and then we saw them… gone. I think he couldn't stand it, so he ran off. Bill and Charlie went after him," she explained, her tone still far away.

Izzy pursed her lips. They wouldn't find him if he didn't want them to – George knew the castle too well. All that time with the map… Then, all of a sudden, something hit her. "Them," Izzy mumbled. "You said 'them' gone, not him."

Ginny nodded, biting her lip before turning once again towards the direction of her brother's body… only it wasn't Fred's body she was looking at this time, Izzy noticed for the first time. It was Angelina Johnson's.

"Oh," was all Izzy could say. Fred was gone. And so was his Angelina.

"Percy said they weren't together when it happened, so I guess neither of them knew the other…"

"Ginny!"

Molly's anguished cry cut through her daughter's words thoughts, making her turn to the inconsolable woman in question.

"I need my babies!" Molly cried, looking around for her living children in the room. "Ginny! Ron! Percy!"

"We're here, Mum," Ginny said, already moving towards her mother, who pulled all three against her and promptly started sobbing on them.

With Ginny gone to console her mother, Izzy couldn't stand just being there, staring at Fred's body. She needed to go. She needed to go and find George.

She was marching to the door seconds later, only stopping when Neville placed himself on her way.

"Hey, where are you going?" he asked.

"To find George," she said. "Cover for me with my Mum and if doesn't work… tell her I'm sorry and that I'll try to be back before the hour is up." She was off before he could say anything else.

On her way up the main staircase, she ran into Bill and Charlie coming down all on their own, confirming they hadn't been able to find their brother. Hopefully, she'd be more successful that they'd been.

It didn't start out great, though. She went to the Room of Requirement first, only to find it… locked. The door was there but it wouldn't open – for some reason the handle actually scalded her when she touched it – not seriously, but enough to let her know something was wrong with the room itself. She had to scratch that off the list because, even if George was inside, it was clearly not letting her in.

By the time twenty minutes out of the promised hour were gone, she stopped to think. George could be anywhere but there wasn't nearly enough time to sweep through the whole castle – she needed to start by the most logical places for George to be.

Gryffindor, Quidditch and Mischief – she supposed those were the three words that could be used to most accurately outline the nature of George's years at Hogwarts. The Gryffindor Tower was too obvious and certainly the first place Bill and Charlie would have looked. With the Room of Requirement already searched (or as close as they could get), she supposed that left maybe the Quidditch Pitch, the boathouse, where the twins had mostly kept their smuggled goods in their school years, and a few secret passages.

Then, she suddenly remembered. Secret passages. Fred and George had been in charge of unblocking the secret passages. They'd split up for that sole purpose and agreed to meet later in the secret passage behind the tapestry of the Lady of the Lake. She wasn't sure if the meeting had ever really taken place but it seemed like a logical enough place to try.

She entered the passage through its sixth floor end, only to find it quiet and dark, as most of the torches were dead. She didn't bother lighting them back, instead using her wand to guide herself through the narrow hall.

"George?" she called, hoping to get a response, even if it was him telling her to leave him alone. It didn't come. "Are you there?" But, once more, the only answer she got was the echo of her own voice.

She kept going, nonetheless, accepting that even if George wasn't there, that secret passage actually was the fastest way down to the lower floors. And so it was then, when she was mere yards away from the end of the secret passage, no longer holding on to hope of finding George in there, that she finally spotted him.

Izzy wasn't sure in what state she'd expected to find him – crushed, no doubt, but no specifics beyond that… Still, she found it rather unexpected to walk in on him just sitting on the stone floor, arms crossed over bent knees staring at the nearest wall, like he was stunned or something. Apathetic, that was the word. It would have been less heart-breaking if she'd found him trashing a room in a fit of anger or something. She might have found it easier to intervene that way, while, finding him in such a state made her wonder what she should do or say.

Izzy knew he must have heard her steps but he still didn't move, not even when she sunk down to the floor by his side.

"George," she breathed after a few seconds.

He stayed as silent and as immobile as before.

"George I… I saw it in the Great Hall…" _Fred's body, _she thought to herself, recognizing that as something far too awful to say. "I am so… so sorry," she whispered to him, feeling her words come out empty, pale in comparison to how she really felt.

As she half-expected, though, he didn't respond.

"I know it hurts. I won't presume to know how much but it's got to be more than a lot," she said. "And I don't know how to make it better, so please tell me what to do. Anything – because we've got little more than thirty minutes of that hour You-Know-Who gave us and by the time those minutes are gone, you need to be good enough to get back on your feet and fight for your life. So, tell me how to make it happen, George."

Her pleading was left without an answer, once again. She was starting to lose her footing.

"Is it time you need, George? A little time to get your head in order? Because I can give you a few minutes. You shouldn't be alone, though, so I'll be here. Unless you tell me not to be."

He didn't, so she stayed, sitting there by his side. Before that day, she didn't think it was possible for a person who wasn't in a coma not to move an inch for more than five minutes. The next time she checked her watch, she noted he was going on fifteen without a motion, without a word… almost without a breath.

That's what she started to get desperate. The clock was ticking and he wasn't moving. He wasn't reacting. He wasn't… anything. And that was going to get him killed.

"George, please," she pleaded, moving to kneel opposite him. "Please do something. Say something. _Anything_. Yell at me for being a pest. Hex me. Break stuff. Just _do _something. I beg of you."

But, again, he didn't. She couldn't even tell if he was listening. He just didn't seem to be responding… he didn't seem to be willing to move.

She didn't know what to do – she could practically feel herself panicking. He couldn't stay that way, motionless and helpess. Who knew who could stumble into that secret passage? If the Carrows had known to close it during the school year, they certainly knew it existed. So, leaving him there hoping it was a good enough hiding place was not an option. If some Death Eater stumbled there he'd die And he couldn't die. He just couldn't. She couldn't deal with that again – she couldn't deal with that for real.

In a matter of seconds, her mind went through the possibilities: there was no way she was strong enough to physically drag him away and, even if she did so magically, there was just no time to get him out of the castle. There was always the chance of her staying and covering for him or getting him to his family but those were no solutions – just temporary fixes. George's best shot was to get himself together, even if just enough to be able to move and think rationally – and, Merlin himself knew, that was just revealing itself to be an impossible task.

So, in a desperate attempt get him to snap out of his apathy, she did one of the hardest things she'd ever done in her life: she went right for the open wound, hoping that would be impossible to ignore.

"Look at me, George," she said, her tone low at first. "Look at me!" she repeated, raising her voice. When he still didn't do it, she reached for his face with her hand and made him. He didn't fight her – he seemed too far gone to try. His eyes were empty and unfocused. He seemed like a far cry from the George she usually knew. That was why it would cost her even more to do what she was about to do.

"Fred is gone," she told him. That seemed to catch his attention as there was a clear flicker of pain in his eyes. "He's _dead_. That's not going to change. He's not coming back, no matter how much you silently beg the universe to make this all a bad dream, no matter how long you sit here and let it eat you up or whatever it is you're doing. That will just get you killed as well and if you stay here and let that happen, you'll just be betraying Fred because he was counting on you to fight for him. For yourself." Every word coming out of her mouth felt like acid burning her very insides as payback for being cruel to him. But he needed it – there was no time to ease him into the reality that was a world without Fred because the Death Eaters were coming back in a matter of minutes. George needed to be shocked, slapped and shaken by the truth. He needed it as a fuel to fight… to live. Or at least she hoped he did, or else they were both in big trouble. "Fred died but you didn't, so, snap out of it. Snap out of it, right now, George, because he's not coming back and you owe it to him to fight for your own life!"

By the time she finished, his eyes were no longer unfocused. There was still a shadow of emptiness in them, but it heavily contrasted with the look of shock on his face as he regarded her. He just looked at her heavily for endless seconds – she didn't move or blink. She was just waiting for him to do something… something that would show she hadn't broken him with her words.

He did, eventually. He spoke… "Go away," he told her, his voice low and hard as he eyed her with a glare on his face.

"What?"

"I said _go… away,"_ he told her, yelling the last part so loud she actually had to physically back down. "Get the hell out of here, Isabelle! Why are you here? Why did you have to bloody come here today? You should be home. You should be _far, far away_ and you should have never come here today in the first place!" he told her furiously.

That time, she was the one staring at him immobile. Shock… resentment… anger. She could hear them all in his voice. She'd gone too far… she'd been too cruel. It had worked, she knew. He was going to fight – she'd been able to see it in his eyes. But at what cost had she managed that? "George…"

"Fred is dead. You wanted me to face it, so there it is – Fred is _dead_ and you're still _here._ And I don't want you here. So, go."

But, that time, she was the one who couldn't move. And, that time, he was the one with the solution: he got up and walked away instead without another word.

She'd known it was going to be horrible. From the moment she'd changed strategies to get a reaction out of him, she'd known, of course, that there was no way hearing those things was going to get a good reaction out of George. Still, it hurt… so much. Especially because she felt like she had it coming, if not for anything else, for karmic payback to her previous feelings of relief over Fred's death.

But it didn't matter, she told herself. It didn't matter because George was reacting. He was moving. Hopefully, he was going to channel that fury into the battle. And he'd have a chance to live. So hating her was a small price to pay. Thinking of that was the one thing that held her together long enough to get up and walk back to the Great Hall, rather than sit there and simmer in her own shock like George had.

She vaguely noticed that things weren't as awful in the Great Hall as she recalled seeing them before: most of the bodies had been moved and there were far less injured people lying around than before. The Weasleys had left as well, having followed Fred's body, she imagined. Elizabeth was still around, helping move a girl with a splinted leg onto a stretcher. As for her mother…

"_Izzy, are you trying to give me a heart attack?!_" she heard her mother's distinctive voice saying from her right. When she turned to face it, Mia was walking on her direction, Lulu following shortly behind. "What were you thinking? We've only got five minutes left until the Death Eaters return! Your grandfather is looking for you everywhere. And you're lucky your father isn't back yet!"

"I'm sorry," she mumbled. "I didn't think it'd take this long."

"Well, it did. And you shouldn't have gone without asking in the first place. For the love of Merlin, you know you're supposed to be in a tight leash…" She stopped talking suddenly, starting to look at her oddly. "Izzy, what's wrong?"

She pursed her lips and shook her head, wanting to do anything but talk about what was wrong. "It's nothing."

"Well, 'nothing' isn't supposed to make you cry," Lulu told her.

Izzy frowned, reaching to her face with one hand only to feel a trail of wetness down her cheek. Great – she was crying. Her own damn body was betraying her.

"Honey, tell me what's wrong," her mother said, as her voice softened considerably. "What happened? Is it George?"

And, that was it. At the sole mention of his name out loud, she was done, crumbling into a humiliating fit of tears that was just about the last thing she wanted to happen.

Mia caught her immediately, holding her as she cried and shooting Lulu completely clueless looks, as if asking her if she had any idea what was wrong with her daughter.

Lulu shook her head, just as clueless, and excused herself seconds later, the moment Gabe stepped back into the room, presumably to tell him there was no need for him to keep looking for their granddaughter.

"Izzy, please tell me what's wrong," Mia asked of her daughter as she sobbed. She unwrapped her arms from around her, though her hands remained on her shoulders. "Please. I need to know. Did something happen? Are you okay? Is George okay?"

Izzy shook her head. "Nothing is… okay," she sniffed

"What happened?"

"He… he wasn't reacting," she said between hiccups. "He just… sat there… looking at nothing. He wouldn't speak… He wouldn't move. And he had to move. It's a… battle. If you don't move, you die."

Mia nodded in understanding but didn't interrupt her.

"I tried to wait and to… to help, but he just wouldn't… do anything, so I said…" she paused, still hiccupping every few seconds, sighing before turning her face into some sort of disgusted expression "… awful things. I just wanted him to face it and to… fight for himself but I went too far. And now he hates me."

"Of course he doesn't."

"He does. The things he said…"

"People say all sorts of things they don't mean when they're hurting," Mia assured her, wrapping her arms around her again.

Izzy sniffed once more, but didn't respond. "We were so close to finally letting it happen. And now I ruined it. He hates me."

With a sigh, her mother smoothed her hair. "He doesn't. I'm sure he doesn't. Not really. Maybe he just needs time to grieve and then everything is going to be okay, sweetheart. You'll see. But we need to go. The Death Eaters are returning at any moment and Madam Pomfrey is expecting us back at the Hospital Wing."

Izzy nodded, using her sleeve to clean up the tears still on her face. Now it was her turn to follow her own words to George – she had to buck up and focus on the battle at hand. She could be as miserable as she wanted afterwards. "Is Dad really not back yet?" she asked, just recalling her mother's earlier words.

Her mother replied with a nod. "Don't worry about it. I told him to keep Tonks some company until everything calmed down a little on their side," she said, even though she was starting to worry a little.

The worry didn't last much longer, though, since, seconds later, as the two of them were walking out of the Great Hall, Mia's arm firmly wrapped around her daughter's shoulders, and starting to climb the first steps of the grand staircase, Sirius was making his way down.

"Hey, Pomfrey said you were…" He paused, noticing Izzy's red-rimmed eyes. "What's wrong?"

Izzy tensed, wondering if her mother was going to rat her out on the whole going-after-George-while-supposedly-grounded thing because she wasn't sure if she could take being yelled at again. Mia didn't, however.

"Things are bad out there, Sirius," she said. "It's just hitting her hard." It wasn't a lie in the true sense of the word. Things _were _bad and it _was _hitting everyone hard. Izzy was just being more affected by one of those bad things in specific – George's grief over Fred's death. And, as much as she always valued telling her husband the whole truth, Izzy's feelings for George were not for her to tell. "How is Remus?" she asked, purposely shifting the conversation to another matter.

Sirius shook his head. "It's too early to tell. One of the nurses said you and Madam Pomfrey did a good job, though."

Mia nodded. "And Tonks?"

"A wreck. Andromeda had just arrived when I left – she had to bring Teddy along since basically everyone who could babysit is here. It's good that she did, though: the moment Tonks got a hold of the kid, she seemed to get it together a little," he explained. "But what about here? Is everyone we know okay? The Weasleys? Your parents?"

"Lulu and Gabe are fine. They were just here a moment ago," she replied.

"And the Weasleys?" Sirius insisted, not missing the fact that she purposely kept them out of her explanation and that Izzy had apparently started holding her breath at the mention of them. It wasn't hard to guess why – something bad had happened. "Who?"

Mia sighed. "Fred… he didn't make it."

Sirius seemed positively shocked for a moment. Of all of them, Fred was about the last one he'd have guessed that would die. "He's just a kid," he mumbled.

His wife nodded. "And the saddest part is that he's not even the youngest one to…"

"_Harry Potter is dead_." Voldemort's voice felt like a punch to the stomach as it rang through the whole castle even louder than it had exactly one hour before.

It sounded like a foreign language to them at first, as Sirius, Mia and Izzy just stood there, frozen like statues trying to translate it into something that made sense – something that wouldn't mean the words that, if they were honest to themselves, they had perceived.

"_He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him,_" the Dark Lord continued.

If the previous words had brought shock, the last ones had dragged anger along. And with anger came denial – and not a completely unfunded sort. "He's lying," Sirius said without a shadow of a doubt. "It's a trick." He turned to Mia, who still looked like someone had just slapped her, and continued. "You know Harry – he wouldn't run to save himself. All of it is a lie, Mia. You know it is."

Izzy nodded by her mother's side, holding on to her father's words like an anchor. Of course it was a lie. Harry wasn't dead. Not like that. Voldemort had taken the lie too far – he'd given himself away.

"_We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone_," Voldemort announced.

"He's trying to lure us out," Sirius said, trying to voice justification after justification for every ´lie' the Dark Lord fed them. Still, as it seemed, not everyone was buying his explanations. "Mia, where are you going?" he called after his wife the moment he saw her turning on her heel and walking towards the castle's main entrance, from where the voice had clearly come. "Mia!"

He followed after her, Izzy on a tow, and was only able to stop her once he grabbed her arm, only a couple of steps away from the doors.

She turned with an angry look on her face, her eyes starting to redden even though no tears fell. "Let go!"

"What are you doing?! He's just trying to lure us, Mia!"

"You don't know that!" she yelled back as Voldemort's voice kept sounding in the background – whatever it was about, they weren't listening anymore.

"It could be a trap," he warned. "It _probably_ is."

"I don't care! He's my son – I need to _know_!" Then, yanking her arm out of his grasp, she walked off towards the crowd that was already forming just outside the doors, waiting for Voldemort and his Death Eaters to show up with Harry's alleged dead body.

Later she'd consider it ironic that she was the one recklessly walking off while Sirius was the one trying to stop her, since the roles were usually reversed. But, at the moment, she just didn't care – Harry could be gone and, as far as she was concerned, the Earth itself would stop turning up until she knew if that was or wasn't the truth. And if it was… if it was, she wasn't sure it would ever resume.

She found herself blasting through the crowd, rudely pushing whoever appeared on her way until she stood at the front. To her own surprise, she felt her hand being caught seconds later and turned to find Sirius standing at her side.

"I thought you were sure this was a trap," she barely managed to say.

He sighed. "I am. But if you have to walk into one anyway, you'd better be sure I'll be right there with you," he assured her.

She grasped his hand back harder, thankful for the unconditional vote of support. "Izzy?" she asked him.

"Lulu's got her," he replied.

She nodded, leaning her head sideways onto his shoulder as the two of them, as well as the growing crowd, waited. "How can you be so sure it is all a lie?" she had to ask her husband at some point, maybe a couple of minutes after they'd joined the crowd.

"Because Harry Potter survived a killing curse when he was one year old. Then, he went on to live through another showdown with the same bloke when he was eleven and then one more time when he was twelve… and twice more at fourteen and fifteen. And in the meantime, at thirteen, he went back in time just to save me from having my soul sucked out by Dementors. If that's not doing the impossible over and over… and over again, I don't know what is," he told her calmly. "So, you can be sure that, even if it kills me, I won't believe this is over until I touch his cold hard body with my bare hands."

Mia nearly trembled once she heard her husband's words. It was unbelievable how deep his trust in their godson's abilities went. "I wish I could have that much faith," she said in a whisper.

He wrapped one arm around her. "You do. You're just not as chronically pig-headed as I am."

She pushed herself closer against him, drinking in the moment of comfort he was offering before it all potentially went to hell.

Sirius held his wife in return, just then taking the time to look over her shoulder at the various people making up the crowd they were in. Right at the front, he could spot several teachers, order members as well as DA ones. Those who really stood out seemed to be McGonagall, dignified as ever, Kingsley, always the leader and… Neville, apparently holding a sword of Gryffindor in a not-awkward-at-all manner. Next, he spotted the Weasleys – all minus George, whose sombre-self Sirius recalled passing at the back of the crowd when he was walking to join Mia. Molly and Arthur looked the most miserable he'd ever seen them, which was no surprise, given their son's demise. Ginny stood nearby, right beside Bill and…

Sirius had to pause for a moment, blink and frown. Ginny was standing next to _Izzy._ Izzy who'd apparently given Lulu the slip. He huffed. Honestly, he didn't even know why he was surprised – for a moment he actually had to curse at his own sneaky genes. He sent a glare his daughter's way but either she didn't see it or she pretended she didn't.

Yet, before he had a chance to even step away from Mia so he could have a word with Izzy, the blurry outline of Voldemort's army became visible at a distance, surrounding a very large shape that, even though they could hardly tell anyone apart at that distance, could only belong to Hagrid. Everyone held their breath at that moment, Sirius himself included, and all the low-volume chatter that had been going around until then went mute.

He felt Mia tense as she felt the change in the mood as well and, just to make sure she wouldn't just lose it and bolt towards the approaching mass of Death Eaters, shifted his position so she was standing with her back against his chest, allowing his arms to wrap themselves around her from behind.

Tension rose with every step Voldemort, Hagrid and the Death Eaters took their way. Even though he forced himself to stick to the belief that all of that was a play until his bare hands told him otherwise, Sirius had never been more aware of the heart thumping madly in his chest.

When it became undeniable that Hagrid was carrying something – someone – he started feeling Mia losing control of her emotions. She tensed even more, if that was even possible, and her head kept shaking as she mumbled 'No. Please, no' over and over again under her breath.

Soon, the 'no' became the general word of choice among the crowd. McGonagall was the first to shout it. Ginny was the second, going even louder as Bill had to physically restrain her to keep her from running all the way to Harry's dead body. By her side, Izzy was frozen – she only moved to look over at her father, silently begging him to come up with an explanation for that not to be true.

A staged death, Sirius forced himself to think immediately. They were staging Harry's death to get them to give up… or to lure Harry out of wherever he was. It was certainly some sort of conjured dummy or someone under Polyjuice. Maybe it was even some sort of general magically-induced hallucination… Every explanation seemed to sound less and less plausible, but he didn't let that stop him: that was the Wizarding World – weirder things had happened in the past. And he was painfully aware that, the moment he stopped believing… the moment he ceased trying to find another explanation, he'd be just as bad as Mia was.

She'd started going limp in the midst of her sobbing the moment it became clear that the person Hagrid was carrying was – apparently, Sirius added in his mind – indeed Harry. He couldn't blame her for completely losing her bearings over that – for all she knew, she was living the nightmare she'd been dreading ever since they'd first heard of the prophecy. So, with little to none hesitation, he followed her down to the floor, wrapping his arms around her as her body shook with grief.

He didn't have it in him to insist with her on his belief that it was all a fake – he felt like that would only upset her further. Still, he couldn't just let her slip away. "Please don't give up," he whispered. "He wouldn't want you to."

His wife didn't respond, though she held on harder, like he was the only thing keeping her from shutting down.

He barely listened to the back-and-forth taking place on the background between Neville and Voldemort himself but, once it culminated on the younger boy cutting off Voldemort's pet snake's head, it became impossible to ignore. Especially with what came after.

"_Harry_!" Hagrid's booming voice shouted. "_Harry! Where's Harry!_?"

He was up in a flash, bringing Mia along with him. Everyone around stood in confusion, wondering, asking and looking, trying to figure out how Harry's body had vanished from Hagrid's hands without any apparent help other than Hagrid's full-blooded giant half-brother appearing out of nowhere.

Sirius couldn't help allowing his chest to expand with newfound hope and, looking at Mia, he clearly saw there was some light back in her red-rimmed eyes, as if she was allowing herself to believe just a little bit that he might be right. He didn't mention it, though.

The crowd around them started to scatter as the battle resumed. "Where's Izzy?" Mia asked, her voice still quite faint.

Sirius glanced over to where he'd last seen their daughter but she wasn't there anymore, a fact he welcomed with some relief since she'd clearly moved away from the front line. "Come on, let's find her," he told his wife, who nodded and allowed him to drag her along.

They soon found themselves in the Great Hall, where nearly everyone was duelling. However, the weirdest thing seemed to be happening: although Death Eaters were dropping left and right like they were supposed to, not a single spell aimed at the fighters whose allegiance was to Harry and the Order hit the target. It was so bizarre Sirius almost felt like he was in the middle of a freak show. Had someone showered them with Felix Felicis while they weren't paying attention?

Some Death Eaters started to run, overwhelmed by their impossibly bad aim, a group of them nearly knocking over Sirius and Mia on their way out without even trying to harm them in any way – they were just so freaked out they wanted to get the hell away.

Somehow in the middle of all that mess, the duellers ended up unwillingly pushing Sirius and Mia on opposite directions. He lost sight of his wife for that reason and, unable to spot her in the middle of all that mess, had to move further into the room – carefully avoiding the centre of it, where Voldemort battled about a dozen aurors at once – hoping he could see her from a less crowded area.

He finally spotted her when he was standing near the entrance of the Trophy room and was glad to find she had Izzy with her. They seemed to be caught in a four-way to one duel with Bellatrix, who seemed quite frustrated with their constant ability to escape her spells, which reached the point of statistical impossibility.

He was just about to join them, also hoping to get a chance to help taking down the miserable bitch, when a massive blow sent him flying into the trophy room. He landed against one of the trophy displays but not a single shard of the glass that broke against his back pierced him, though his wand flew out of his grasp somewhere along the way. All of a sudden, he found himself face-to-face with Fenrir Greyback, who pushed him against the wall right next to the display, holding him by the neck just tight enough that he wouldn't choke too fast but also wouldn't feel too comfortable breathing.

"Fancy running into you, Black," the man – if he could even be called that – said. "I was just wondering where your friend Lupin was. Thought this might be as good a time as any to rid the world of another traitor to his kind."

"Well, then I guess it will really irk you that you kind of… saved his life today," Sirius managed to gasp, hoping that would grab enough of the werewolf's attention so he could safely grab one of the trophies in the nearby display. "Long story," he added when he saw Greyback frown at him.

"Where is he?"

"Far out of your reach," he said, wrapping his hand around the handle on one of the trophies.

Greyback glared. "Well, then I suppose I'll have to pass my disappointment along through a friend," he said, clearly not meaning a written message or a spoken one.

Sirius got a feeling that he meant something along the lines of mailing Remus the severed head of said friend or something just as gruesome. And apparently that friend just happened to be him.

"Yeah, I'd rather you didn't," he said just before using the heavy trophy to hit the werewolf across the head.

Knowing the ridiculous werewolf invulnerability was in Greyback's favour, he didn't kid himself by thinking the damn thing would cause much more than an annoying bump, though he hoped that would distract Greyback enough for him to escape his hold.

However, if that was the case, the werewolf's reaction was fairly out of proportion. The moment the trophy smacked him, his opponent howled in pain, staggering back as he clutched his head in a way Sirius thought only being ran over by the Hogwarts Express could cause.

Confused, he took a moment to look at the trophy, trying to find if there was anything special about it. It looked perfectly normal, shaped as a large cup with a handle on each side. The writing on the side indicated it had been given to a Laurence Fothergill bloke for making it to second place on the 1865 Inter-School Wizard's Chess Tournament. And, just like that, it hit him – _second_ place. The damn thing was made of silver.

"Well, look at that," Sirius mumbled under his breath, realizing silver was more of an Achilles' Heel for Werewolves that he'd ever realized. A few feet away, Greyback seemed to be regaining his footing but, before he could do anything, Sirius swung the trophy hard across his jaw, actually feeling it pop out of the place before the werewolf hit another display and fell to the floor, unconscious. "Eat that, you bloody son of a bitch." Proud of himself, Sirius dropped the trophy down on the floor, barely caring when it actually landed straight on Greyback's leg.

Then, Sirius walked over to the general area his wand must've landed in order to retrieve it and, once he had it back, he took a moment to stand over Greyback's unconscious form. He didn't feel quite right about killing him – in his book, if anyone had the right to do it, that person was Moony. And then again, after all he'd done, Sirius figured death was too good for him. With a huff, he sent a stunner the werewolf's way, just to make sure he wouldn't wake up anytime soon. Then, he cast a disillusionment charm over him to make sure some Death Eater wouldn't show up and rescue him while he was busy elsewhere.

"You'd better wish I make it through this battle alive, or else you're going to rot here, which is nothing less than you deserve," he told the unconscious werewolf's invisible form before turning on his heel and walking away.

As it seemed, he exited the trophy room just at the right moment – exactly in time to watch as Molly Weasley sent Bellatrix flying out of a window in front of a rather large audience, in which were both Izzy and Mia. He felt like clapping at the redhead but, before he had a chance, the thing he'd probably wished for the most that day happened: just as a rather angry Voldemort aimed his wand at the killer of his most faithful servant, a very familiar voice roared a shield charmed and the allegedly deceased Harry showed up in the middle of the room all of a sudden, having been hiding under James' invisibility cloak the whole time.

As Harry asked people to refrain from helping him in what was bound to be the final face-down between him and Voldemort, Sirius made his way back to his family, who was now standing as part of a circle of spectators around them. By then, nearly all Death Eaters had either fallen or defected. The few who remained, namely the Malfoys, were acting just as quiet and harmless as the people on their side.

Once he reached Mia and Izzy's side, his wife was still staring at their godson with a look of utter shock on her face, as if she was seeing a ghost. As much as Harry's earlier disappearing act had allowed her to hope, she'd never actually let herself believe he might still be alive. Sirius laid a hand on her shoulder and she didn't even turn, so fixed her eyes were on her godson. He could tell she knew he was there, though, as her hand reached up to touch his.

"I can't believe it," she mumbled.

"I told you: that kid is completely impossible," he said.

"How did he do it?" Izzy mumbled from Mia's other side.

Sirius shrugged. "You'll have to ask him."

"Shh," Mia hushed them, trying to hear what Harry was saying.

It was a strange conversation, the one going on between his godson and Voldemort, Sirius thought. The kid seemed like he had it all figured out – or at the very least he sounded confident enough to pretend he did.

It actually made for a rather informative chat for everyone around them. As it seemed, the reason why no-one from their side was being hit by any spell or suffering any harm ever since Harry's 'death' was because he'd given himself over to protect them (that was going to be a looong chat between them once the whole thing was over) the same way Lily had given herself over to protect him. And, speaking of Lily, apparently Snape had been working undercover for them all along… because apparently he'd been secretly in love with Lily since they were kids – honestly, Sirius just had no idea of what to make of that revelation (he wasn't even sure if he should believe it) but it certainly served to keep him from being completely jubilous over the news of Snape's death. Unfair as it might be, Sirius felt a bit cheated over the lack of said jubilee – it was like Severus Bloody Snape had mailed him one last kick in the groin from under the grave. It seemed oddly fitting.

The latter part of the conversation was less clear – something about some 'elder wand' (wasn't that from some fairy-tale he'd read Alex?) and how Harry actually owned it because he'd disarmed Draco Malfoy at some point… Of course, by then the tension widely overpowered the words, with the Harry and Voldemort circling around each other like they were wild dogs aiming for each other's jugulars.

And aim they did, though it was with their wands, rather than their teeth. When Harry cast a simple disarming charm against Voldemort's killing curse, Sirius thought the kid had lost his mind – and his life, along with it – for good. And when the disarming charm caused Voldemort's wand to fly straight into Harry's hand just as the dark lord dropped dead, Sirius had to wonder if he hadn't been knocked out sometime during the battle and wasn't just dreaming it because that kind of thing just _didn't _happen.

But then, his own words sounded in his mind: Harry Potter was impossible. That had never been more obvious that it was at that moment.

There were about ten seconds of confused silence before everyone started cheering and Harry was mobbed from all directions. He was so solidly surrounded that, as much as Sirius and Mia would like to reach their godson, they didn't stand a chance against the mob.

Ginny, who stood near them, having also been beaten to Harry by the mob, wasn't about to let it go victorious. For about two seconds, she glared at the crowd like an enemy, then she plunged into it like a game hunter about to tackle a lion, pushing everyone out of her way until she reached a very overwhelmed Harry at the centre of it, who silently begged her to get him out of there.

"_Alright, everyone, start scattering_," she yelled at everyone around in a commanding tone. "Give the guy a minute of quiet – he's just saved the world! Let him at least say 'hi' to his family."

People seemed a bit disappointed but most of them appeared to understand, promptly walking away. Those who hesitated were glared at by Ginny until they did it anyway. Once they were all gone, Ginny turned to her boyfriend, who seemed more than a little grateful at her interference.

"Thanks – I was starting to think they'd never leave."

Ginny smiled sweetly. "You're welcome." Then, in a slightly disturbing shift, the smile vanished from her face, turning into a glare that was followed by her lifting her hand and slapping him right across the face.

"Bloody hell," Harry managed to say as the sound of the slap still echoed in the room. He felt his jaw with his hand, as if trying to check if it was still in the right place.

"_Never scare me like that again!_" his girlfriend shouted at him. "You… you git! Do you have any idea what if felt like watching you playing dead?! Why do you have to be so bloody good at it?" Just the memory of it made her angry enough to make her punch him on the arm.

"Ginny, could you stop hitting me, please? It's not like I was enjoying it!"

She kept on glaring, promptly poking him on the chest with her index finger. "Never do that again," she threatened.

"Fine by me," he assured her in return.

And, just like that, the glaring ceased and she was hugging him, holding on like her own life depended on it. It was right around then, once Ginny's violent moment was over, that Sirius, Mia and Izzy chose to approach him as well.

He eyed the both of them uncertainly as Ginny stepped back from her hug and moved to stand by his side. "You're not going to slap me too, are you?" he asked, mainly looking at Mia.

Mia sighed, though it sounded like there was a bit of a laugh there, and stepped forward, wrapping her arms around her godson. "You impossible boy. Please tell me you're done giving me sleepless nights."

"Please tell me there's not another prophecy with my name on it out there," he replied.

She let out another sigh before pulling back. "Hopefully not."

Izzy was the next to step in for the hug, though she was rather quiet about it, as she'd generally been since the end of the battle, mumbling little more than something along the lines of 'I'm glad you're alive'.

"So, what now? You won, kid," Sirius said, slapping him on the back.

"Yeah," Harry said, like he wasn't quite so sure about it. Maybe it was the novelty of the thing, but he didn't really feel victorious. He didn't feel like he'd lost either. Just… glad it was over. And, honestly, he had just no idea where to go from there. "I suppose I wouldn't mind getting a good night of sleep. Or a day."

"If you want to go home, we can take you right now," Mia offered. "Really – no one would blame you."

He was tempted to accept it but his conscience spoke louder. "I should probably stay a little longer. Everyone here did risk their lives for me – doesn't seem right to just walk away from them."

Sirius nodded. "Whatever you want, kid. We'll be here waiting," he promised.

Harry seemed thankful in return and, with his hand firmly placed on Ginny's, he excused himself to go talk to his girlfriend's family.

Exhausted as they were, they stayed at the school past dawn. The mood around them was strange – celebration and grief, all rolled up into one. There was cheering and crying and, after someone had brought in the booze, happy drinking and solemn toasting.

Most of unharmed fighters stayed, only a few having left. George was one of those – according to Lee Jordan, he'd walked away minutes after the battle was over. That fact only served to make Izzy more miserable than she already was, as by then she was nearly sure her words had broken George for good. While her mother constantly assured her she hadn't, Sirius obliviously believed her odd behaviour was just a strong reaction to the things she'd seen in the battle – no one bothered to correct his assumption.

News travelled fast around there: Death Eaters were already being rounded up and formally arrested; a group of aurors led by Kingsley had taken back the ministry with little resistance and plans were already being made to identify and sort out those under the Imperius Curse over there; Muggle-borns were being released from Azkaban; Amelia Bones had been re-instated as Minister and was promising big changes. Of course, no news were as anticipated by Sirius as the ones Andromeda Tonks brought once she showed up in the Great Hall.

"Andie," he called, making his way to his cousin the moment he caught sight of her entering the room while Mia was distracted talking to Lulu and Elizabeth. "How is he?"

"Stable, don't worry," the woman said the moment she reached him. "Dora sent me as soon as she heard the battle was over. She wanted me to see if you'd made it. You and, well, your lot, so to speak."

"We're fine. Mia and Izzy too. Harry gave us a bit of a scare but he's alright – but if you know it's over, you probably already knew that bit."

Andromeda nodded, a small smile on her lips. "Everyone is cheering everywhere. Even little Teddy smiled today – his first actual smile, I think… Dora burst into tears because Remus missed it."

"How is he doing, really? Did he wake up? Is he in very much pain?"

"They've got him in a healing coma, right now, so he doesn't feel anything – there's a lot of healing to be done and the healers reckoned putting him out for it would be the best. A nurse friend of mine was there and she said he was conscious – barely – for a couple of minutes before they put him out, which is a good sign. It should be a couple of days at least before the coma wears off and the healers can't be completely sure of the outcome until then but they're confident he might just make a full recovery. They couldn't believe the extent of protection him being a werewolf provided. Everyone knows they're sturdier than normal, but surviving eight-storey falls takes things to a whole new level of sturdiness…"

"Tell me about it. I thought he was done for it when I saw. Tonks did too once she heard. You saw how she was like at the hospital."

His cousin let out a sigh. "Well, she's a bit calmer now. When I left her, she was vowing not to leave Remus's side until he was awake and clutching to Teddy like a toddler to a plush toy. He loves it, of course – little as he is, anyone can tell he adores Dora and Remus like something out of this world." Her lips pursed a bit upon saying so, as she remembered how close her precious grandson had been to losing his beloved parents. "Anyway, I may have to talk her into letting me take the boy home at some point. I may be able to pull some strings and have the nurses let him stay longer than they usually would but they might take issue with letting a month-old baby stay overnight in an intensive care ward." She sighed, knowing her daughter would hate it, but shook her head, reminding herself it had to be done. "I didn't thank you, Sirius, for looking after her before I came."

He shook his head. "Don't mention it. She's family."

The mention of the word 'family' seemed to affect Andromeda on some way. She gulped, and then averted her eyes from his, aiming them to the floor like she was ashamed. "I know I shouldn't ask…"

"Narcissa made it. Bella's dead," Sirius informed her before she could finish, easily guessing what her question was going to be.

His cousin nodded solemnly – she didn't seem particularly full of grief over her now deceased sister. "I know I shouldn't even care anymore. We haven't talked in years. But…"

"You'd still want to know," Sirius said, understandingly. "I get it. I felt the same way about Regulus."

His cousin smiled, thankful that he understood. "I should go. I don't want Dora to be on her own for too long."

"Of course," Sirius said, nodding. "Tell her I'll try and drop by later today, okay?"

When he made his way back to Mia, he found her sitting with Izzy tucked against her on one of the few wide benches that weren't broken, which stood against the wall. Their daughter seemed to be snoozing with her head resting on her mother's shoulder, having finally given into exhaustion.

"Hey, was that Andromeda?" Mia asked the moment she spotted him standing by her. Her arm remained around Izzy, rubbing soothing patterns on their daughter's arm even as she slept.

Sirius nodded, sitting by his wife's side. "Tonks sent her to check on us. It looks like the healers are confident that Moony will be just fine. They have in a coma while he heals."

Mia responded with a nod. "That's good – he'll be more comfortable that way." She paused and let out a sigh. "Can you believe this is it? That it's over?"

He chuckled. "Not by a mile. Because it isn't – over, I mean." Mia eyed him in confusion for a moment. "If you asked me, I'd say everything is just beginning. And, for once, we don't have the shadow of some lunatic set on world domination looming over us."

His wife smiled. "Yeah, I suppose you're right," she agreed.

As they talked, Harry stood at a distance, hugging Ron and Hermione goodbye before doing the same with Ginny, though that action was followed by a kiss in her case. Then, as his two friends and his girlfriend made their way back to the Weasleys, Harry walked towards his godparents.

"Hey, is it okay if we go home now?" he asked them.

His godmother smiled. "Of course."

And so the four of them left Hogwarts behind, heading back home to the once-dreary 12 Grimmauld Place.

It wasn't until Harry stepped the threshold that everything in his head started sliding where it belonged. Because he was back home. He was back home, he had an amazing family, amazing friends, a girl he loved and there was no death threat hovering in the shadows that would keep him from enjoying that the way it should be enjoyed. He'd won – it finally started feeling like he really had.

"Welcome back, kid," Sirius told him, clapping his shoulder as he stepped in.

Harry smiled. It was good to be back.

**A/N2: And so, the last chapter is delivered. Check my profile for a new outtake, focusing on Remus and Tonks, that pieces together with this chapter – It's called **_**St. Mungo's **_**and it's part of **_**Outtakes: The Companion to the Brave New… Series**_**.**

**Also, to the Izzy/George fans, people keep in mind that I plan to continue this fic with a sequel – the name will be **_**States of Mind – **_**that will mostly focus on Izzy and George before you aim to kill me for kind of breaking them up. There's still hope for them. You can count on plenty of Sirius and Mia and everyone else in it as well and the first chapter should be posted shortly after the epilogue.**

**Stay tuned for the epilogue. Feedback is welcome – review!**


	65. Epilogue

**A/N: And so here it is - the epilogue. It's been a long ride, this one, and I'd like to thank everyone who supported me: my readers, my reviewers, my betas... everyone. Thank you so much for everything!**

**When reading this, keep in mind that the sequel will take place before this epilogue. You could call this a little taste of the future... I'll tell you more about this at the end.**

**29 August 2002**

It was a busy day in 12 Grimmauld Place.

The pitter-patter or feet rushing from one place to another sounded throughout the whole house, as well as shouts of one person telling the other to hurry up.

"Sirius, the Portkey is leaving at ten sharp. That's only twenty minutes away," Mia shouted from their bedroom's doorway at the same time as she put her earrings on.

"_Relax, love. We'll make it in time,_" her husband's voice came from the adjacent room.

"We'd better. Or else we'll have to apparate outside the Borrow's wards and wrestle all the reporters out of the way," she replied, just as Mary came running into the room dressed in her flower girl dress.

"Mummy, I found my shoes," she proudly declared, pointing at the feet.

Although her daughter brought good news, Mia couldn't help frowning once she noticed the state of her hair – the hair Mia had fixed up just about ten minutes before. "Honey, what happened to your hair?"

Mary seemed confused for a moment, until she saw her reflection on the mirror behind her mother. "Oh… I found the shoes under the bed," the five-year-old (five and a half, she'd insist) apologetically pointed out. "Sorry, Mummy."

Mia sighed. "It's okay, honey, but you need to be careful. Get up on that chair – I'll fix it up for you in a moment after I call your brother down," she said, heading to the door in order to howler for her son, deciding that it might be a good idea to keep the children within her sight until they left just in order to avoid more delays. "Alex, get down here!"

She made her way back to Mary at the same time as the sound of rushed footsteps on the stairs sounded in the background. As she started pulling pins out of her daughter's long brown hair, using a hairbrush to comb it back into place, a solemn Alex made his way into the room.

With every year that passed, he was more and more like his father: all silky black bair, steely grey eyes and constantly up to something (rarely the good kind of something). In four years, he'd be heading into Hogwarts and likely become the bane of McGonagall's existence… hers as well, if he made it into Gryffindor, which she didn't doubt.

"These clothes are itchy," he complained as he sat down on the foot of his parents' bed already wearing his much-detested dress robes.

"I'm sure they're not that bad," his mother told him as she brushed his sister's hair. "You just need to get used to them."

"What do we have to get all dressed up for in the first place? It's just Harry…" he pointed out. It was beyond him why they had to get all fancy for someone they saw practically every day and who required absolutely no flourishes in their day-to-day life.

"It's just Harry _getting married_, honey. You're supposed to dress up for weddings, especially when you're the family of the groom."

"Why? He hates dressing up too – he told me so when he had to go to that New Year's thing for the Mistry."

"_Ministry_," Mia corrected. "And you're just supposed to, Alex. Besides, it's only a few hours in dressing robes – it'll hardly kill you."

Alex huffed. "These clothes are stupid."

"I think I look pretty," Mary pointed out from the chair.

"You look like a _girl_," Alex said, as if that was meant to be an insult. He was still on that phase when all girls were just plain icky – all girls except the ones he got along with well in a regular basis, whom he classified in his mind as 'honorary boys'. "Can I take the floo to the Burrow now? I want to go play with Finn."

"We're not taking the floo today, honey. And you know you're not allowed to use it on your own until you're ten," Mia told her son. "Besides, _Darcy_," she said, insisting on using his son's friend's real name rather than the nickname Alex had come up with for the single purpose of not reminding himself too often that Darcy Finnigan was, in fact, a girl, "won't get there for a while. She's arriving right before the ceremony like all other guests."

Alex groaned in return. "I hate weddings," he commented.

"That's 'cause you're dumb," Mary replied.

"Mary!" Mia scolded her daughter in an aggrieved tone.

"I'm not. _You _are," Alex said in return.

"Nobody is dumb," their mother stated with a tone of finality. "Now, not another word about that or you're both grounded."

The two children went quiet, knowing their mother meant it, but that didn't stop them from making faces at each other as Mia sighed, shaking her head.

A soft knock on the door caused her to look up and smile at who it was. "Quinn, sweetheart, come on in. Are you all ready to go?"

Young Quinn Evans, her godson's young cousin, nodded as she stood at the door, wearing a pretty olive green dress. She still resembled her aunt Lily Evans quite a bit – softer features, bluer eyes and lighter hair, more strawberry blond than red, were the main differences that gave her away. "Dudley helped me with my hair," she said.

The thought of burly Dudley Dursley helping a little girl with her hair would be laughable at best under normal circumstances. The thing was that circumstances were hardly normal for those two – seeing as for the past couple of years Dudley had been, for all intents and purposes, Quinn's main caretaker, it wasn't surprising he'd have gotten used to such things.

Petunia had remarried about two years after the war. After a rather exhausting divorce process, she'd found herself another man whose name Mia couldn't recall – Dudley and Quinn usually referred him as 'the Colonel'. It was more than just a nickname: apparently, that was actually the man's rank, which he'd reached through his work at the army. He was, according to them, a decent enough man, not as nasty as Vernon had been but just about as dry as Petunia was – two peas in a pod, one might say.

His current assignment had him often travelling around the world, a lifestyle Petunia very much appreciated since she got to join him most of the time. Children, however, didn't quite fit into the plan, so by then Quinn – who Petunia, despite her best efforts, couldn't feel close to, mostly due to her inability to accept her daughter as the witch that she was – had been quickly shipped off to a boarding school near Newcastle. That fact might have been particularly heart-breaking for the little girl if Dudley, by then already working as a police constable in Epsom, hadn't transferred to Newcastle, allowing her to spend most of her weekends out of school with him at his new flat, where he kept a room just for her.

With time, weekends had extended into small school breaks and, that year, into about five sixths of Quinn's summer break, the rest of which Petunia had spent touring South America with the Colonel. She was actually still there, which led her to miss the wedding she certainly wouldn't have gone to even if she was in Britain, Mia was sure.

Even though Quinn and Dudley were frequent guests in 12 Grimmauld Place, often visiting for birthdays and around the holidays, Petunia had always avoided their 'abnormal' company like the plague. She'd tried keeping her children away at first as well but Dudley's defiance and her own lack of enough interest in the girl, which her son resented, had made her feeble attempts lack in success. That time, the plan was for them to stay over for the wedding and a couple of days afterwards, until Quinn was leave for her first year at Hogwarts.

"That's very nice of him," Mia said as she placed the pins back on Mary's hair. "Is he ready to go too?"

Quinn nodded, making her way further into the room and taking a seat by Alex's side. "He's downstairs. Mum called – he's talking to her on his phone," she explained.

"What's a phwone?" Mary asked, mispronouncing the word.

"A phone, Mary," Mia corrected, slightly more familiar with the term.

"It's a thing you use to talk to people when they're not right next to you," Quinn explained.

"Like a fireplace?" Alex asked.

"Hum… yes. But smaller. And without fire," she said.

"That's not a fireplace. If you don't have fire, how do you see who you're talking to?" Mary inquired, confused.

Quinn shrugged. "You don't."

"Well, that's stupid," Alex declared.

"Alex!" Mia scolded.

"You say it's rude not to look at people when they're talking to you," he reminded his mother. "Isn't it stupid to invent something that makes you have to be rude all the time?"

Mia stared at her son, realizing he sort of had a point. Not that he was all that concerned about politeness or lack of thereof – he probably was just glad to get a legitimate reason to say the word 'stupid'.

"They probably just haven't gotten to phones where you can see people's faces yet," Quinn offered. "The Colonel has one that can take pictures if he attaches a thing to it."

"Yes, I'm sure they're heading that way," Mia agreed before placing the last pin on her daughter's hair. "All done again. And please be more careful this time."

"´Kay, Mummy," Mary said, climbing down from the chair.

"Alex, stop tugging at your collar," Mia scolded her son, exasperated.

"But it's trying to strangle me," he replied.

Mia sighed, reaching for her wand. "Alright, come here – I'll try to loosen it a little."

He gladly got up, hoping to charm her mother into a few other changes, like getting rid of the whole dressing robes ensemble, and Mary quickly occupied his previous seat by Quinn's side. "There's something I don't understand," the little girl told Quinn in all seriousness.

"What?"

"If your brother is talking to your Mummy downstairs, why are you here and not there so you can talk to her too?" Mary inquired.

Mia looked up, alarmed that Quinn might be upset by the question. "Honey, Quinn probably doesn't want to answer your questions all day," she told her daughter.

"No, it's alright," Quinn said. She wasn't downstairs to talk to her mother as well, because her mother wasn't interested in talking to her. Of course, Mary would never understand it if she told her that, so she used one of the excuses Dudley had tried to feed her at first. "She's in Bolivia now. Calls from there are very expensive – it's best if Dudley talks for both of us."

"Oh," Mary mumbled.

"You have to _pay_ to be able to talk to people?" Alex asked, frowning. "Muggles are weird."

"I'm sure they'd say the same bout us," Mia pointed out before turning to Quinn, hoping to intervene in order to change the direction of the conversation. "So, are you excited to be a bridesmaid today, Quinn?"

The young girl smiled and nodded – having Ginny inviting her to stand as one of her bridesmaids had probably been one of the highpoints of her still short life. She liked Ginny – she and her family were always nice to her and every once in a while she'd get her and Dudley tickets to go see her Quidditch games with Harry or Sirius, when her cousin couldn't make it due to work. And, just a few days before, she and Izzy had even taken her to a sleepover in the flat they shared, where they were joined by the other bridesmaids, Luna and Hermione – it had probably been the most exciting night of her life. Her mother had said brides only wanted bridesmaids so they had someone to be nasty to when Quinn had mentioned being one during the short week she'd spent at her house during Summer break – Ginny was nothing like that, though. As far as she was concerned, her mother was the nasty one. "I'm just supposed to keep an eye on Mary and make sure she doesn't ruin her flower girl dress, right? Other than standing by Ginny during the ceremony, I mean."

Mia nodded. "Yes, the other bridesmaids can handle the rest. Just keep an eye on her and bring her to me if she gets dirty," she instructed before turning to her daughter. "And you be a good girl to Quinn."

"I'm always a good girl," Mary said innocently, just as Sirius was walking in with her younger brother, Evan, on his hip. "Daddy, tell Mummy and Quinn I'm always a good girl."

"She's always a good girl when she's not being precious little nightmare," Sirius declared as he placed his nearly three-year-old son on the floor and let him walk over to Mia, to whose leg he latched on.

"Daddy!" Mary complained, pouting.

Sirius chuckled, approaching the pouting girl and picking her up – even though she was getting way too heavy for that – just so he could place a kiss on her rosy cheek. "That's okay, baby – Daddy loves you despite that," he said before putting the no-longer pouty girl back on the floor and turning to Mia. "Everyone here ready to go?"

"I think so," his wife responding before turning to Alex again and frowning. "For the love of Merlin, Alex, stop tugging at your collar. It can't possibly still be strangling you."

"It's itchy!" he complained.

"It can't be that bad. Your brother is practically wearing the same thing," Mia argued before reaching down to pick up little Evan. "Are your clothes itchy, honey?"

Her youngest son shook his head. "No, Mama."

She gave Alex a look. "See?"

"But he never complains about _anything_," Alex said.

Mia sighed. Alex did have half a point there – there was probably no child more agreeable in the world than young Evan Black. He was practically always happy, hardly ever threw tantrums or fussed when he was being dressed and he ate anything anyone put on his plate without as much as a frown… unless there were carrots involved, which was, all in all, fair enough. With their history of loud and stubborn children, she and Sirius had had to wonder if there was something physically wrong with him. Or mentally. Or… in any way. Turned out, there wasn't – they were just blessed with a rather contented child who seemed to have avoided the dominant troublemaking genes that seemed to come with having Sirius for a father.

"Come on, kid – I know you hate the clothes but just think of what fun it will be to get them all dirty once all the pictures are taken," Sirius told Alex, who started to look less sceptical.

"Sirius!" Mia scolded her husband.

"What? This is what cleaning charms were made for. It's a fair compromise," he pointed out before turning to his so again. "Don't rip them, though – that's harder to fix. You need to dip it into potion and it stinks… just don't do it, okay?"

"Okay. Lots of dirt but no ripping," Alex agreed, satisfied enough with the free card to get dirty all over. Maybe there would be mud near the pond… mud seemed like a good enough kind of revenge on the stupid dress robes.

"Perfect. Now, everyone under five feet tall get marching downstairs because the Portkey is off in ten minutes. Quinnie, would you mind terribly taking Evan down too? Your Auntie Mia and I just need a couple of minutes to have a word and we'll be right down with you."

Quinn nodded eagerly as Mia placed Evan back down on the floor. All it took was for the older girl to stretch her hand the toddler's way and he running towards her, taking her hand as all four children walked out.

The moment they were on their own, Sirius turned to his wife and grinned. "See? All settled. Am I or am I not a top notch husband?"

"If Alex throws himself into the pond during his mission to ruin those dress robes, you're the one who'll be giving him a bath," Mia warned him.

He chuckled at her and planted a soft kiss on her mouth. "Alright," he easily agreed. And by the way, you look quite lovely today, Mrs Black," he complimented her, taking a look at the midnight blue dress she was wearing.

"You think? Not too much for the acting mother-of-the-groom?"

He shook his head. "Never too much," he assured her. "So, acting mother-of-the-groom, nervous about seeing your oldest cub getting married today?"

Mia sighed. "He so… grown up," she said, feeling a nostalgic sensation in her chest. "Where has time gone? I feel like just yesterday Lily was holding him in her arms as a newborn."

"Nice to see you're willing yourself to forget the very stressing years that came between today and that 'yesterday' of yours," he commented.

She sighed. "You know what I mean. He's all grown up and getting married. And it just gets me thinking that tomorrow maybe it will be Izzy, and then Alex, and then…"

"Wow, hold on a minute," Sirius stopped her. "Alex is seven and he's yet to think of girls as anything but the scourge of the world – I'm pretty sure that one won't be ringing the wedding bells for the next decade, at the very least. As for Izzy… well, unfortunately she does not consider boys the scourge of the world but she knows she's not allowed to get married until she's like fifty…" he found himself at the end of a strange look by Mia "…hum, forty?" Another look. "Thirty, then." She still didn't look satisfied with that. Sirius huffed. "Alright, let's just say that she's not engaged yet, so let's not worry about that until she is."

Mia sighed. She knew he had a point. "I'm being stupid, aren't I?" she asked. "It's not like this is only just starting today. I mean, Harry has lived on his own for quite a while and Izzy moved out even before he did. But now he's starting a life with the girl he loves and someday soon a family of his own as well – it makes me really happy that he gets to do that but it also gets me a little nostalgic about that little boy who used to come running to get me every time Izzy as much as moved in her cot when she was a newborn."

Sirius wrapped one arm around his wife, planting a comforting kiss at the top of her head. "He'll always be that little boy deep down, love," Sirius assured him. "Really – the first time you got cross enough at me to kick me out, all I wanted to do was to go and hide behind Judy Potter's back. So, trust me, there will always be a time when he'll come running to you, either it is when he first experiences the post-marital rage of Ginny or when his first kid does something really weird that completely freaks him out. Sooner or later, he will. And in the meantime, you can go on gathering future nostalgic material from Alex, Mary, Evan and any potential future child…"

"Don't even try," Mia warned, interrupting him with narrowed eyes. "Just because I'm a bit sentimental over my emptying nest, don't think I forgot that you promised Evan would be the last child we have. I can't keep popping out babies until I'm fifty, Sirius!"

"You're a long way from fifty. Besides, it's not my fault my boys are… accident prone," he mumbled.

"They won't be if I floo Elizabeth and have her set up an appointment with that healer friend of hers I told you about. Then no more 'accidents' – the actually accidental ones or otherwise," she pointed out. "So, are you sure you want to make me doubt your ability to keep 'accidents' under wraps without need for intervention?"

Sirius gulped, shaking his head blankly. He cleared his throat. "We've got four minutes. We should go."

His wife smiled, grabbing her coat and lacing her arm with his. "Glad to see we're on the same page," she told him before they walked out.

They ran straight into Dudley making it back into the living room just as they reached the ground floor. "Sorry, I had to step out – couldn't get any decent reception in here," he said.

"Don't worry, you got here just in time," Mia assured him as they entered the living room. "How was your mother, then?"

"The same as always," he said blandly. "They're moving on to Peru tomorrow." He then turned to Quinn, who was looking back at him from the sofa with Evan on her lap. "Mum says for you to have fun."

No, she didn't, Quinn knew. She never said that kind of thing – not to her, at least. Dudley always made it up that she did so she wouldn't feel bad. Quinn didn't, in any case, but it made Dudley feel better that he thought she bought it, so she always went along with it. "That's nice of her," she said softly.

"Alright, then," Sirius said. "Everyone grab your coats right now – better put them on while we get through the Portkey journey. Alex, you and your brother are with your Mum. Mary, you're with me. Just hold on to us – don't let go for anything in the world. The same goes to you," he added, turning to Dudley and Quinn, the inexperienced ones in terms of Portkey travelling. "Hold on to the portkey. Don't let go under any circumstance, okay? It's going to be a little hard but it's worth it if you want to avoid landing badly," Sirius explained, making the siblings look rather nervous. "Oh, don't worry. People hardly ever die from Portkey travel."

That wasn't particularly comforting either. "And… er, where exactly is that 'portkey' thing?"

"Oh, it's right here," he said, picking up some sort of roll that was resting against a chair near the door. He unrolled it, revealing it to be a rug about five feet long.

"Sirius, did you snatch that from the library? Lulu brought me that rug from Turkey last year!" Mia said, looking at him in annoyance. "I thought you were using that old goblet you found in the attic as a Portkey."

"I was, but with all of us, this is so much easier to grab onto. I promise I won't ruin it. Really – if you want to, I'll have Kreacher bring it back the moment we get there," he said.

Mia sighed. "Kreacher has enough on his hands helping setting things up for the wedding today. But that had better make it back home safe and sound. It's part of a set," she warned him before turning to little Evan at the same time as Sirius got a hold of Mary. "Come here, baby. You too, Alex – hold onto my arm and don't let go. It's almost time."

"Yes, thirty seconds to go," Sirius confirmed, checking his watch. "Alright, everyone. Hold on tight."

* * *

"Is it too late for me and Harry to just up and elope?" Ginny mused out loud.

Izzy peered at her friend over the magazine she was reading. The redhead sat at the window in her bathrobe, appearing quite thoughtful as she looked out of it. It was impossible to tell if she meant what she was saying as anything more than a hypothetical question. "Yes, it definitely is," she replied.

Ginny turned to her, frowning. "How can you possibly be so sure of that? I have a broom, Harry does too, we're both cleared to cross the wards. All it takes is me running down the hall and telling him to get a move on. He'll go along with it in a blink of an eye."

"What on Earth would you do that for?" Izzy asked in disbelief. "The worst part, which is the planning is already over. Everything is set up outside, the invitations are sent and replied to, the cake is here and your hair is already done. All you have to do now is put the dress on, walk down the bloody aisle and say your vows. Then it's done – you're Mrs Ginny Potter."

"But does it have to be such a blasted circus? I can see the stupid reporters rubbing themselves against the wards from here," the redhead said in a frustrated manner, getting up and starting to pace.

"Yeah, but they can't see us from there," Izzy pointed out.

"Still, they're making a damn spectacle out of it. You're literally holding a magazine claiming to have 'exclusive details' about my wedding!"

Izzy threw said magazine into a nearby bin. "Sure, but we both know you're not wearing a diamond-covered dress and arriving in a carriage pulled by winged horses that descend from the legendary Pegasus and were especially brought in from Greece. That would just be plain overboard," she pointed out before sighing and standing up in order to approach her friend. She smoothed over the long olive-green bridesmaid dress she was already wearing and walked over to Ginny, placing her hands on her shoulders. "Look, we both know this is not about the press – you couldn't care less about what they write. But you're freaking out because you're getting married and anyone who knows you well also knows that being nervous makes you angry – in this case, at the reporters themselves, who are a constant pain in your arse. So, you're going to take a breath and you're going to listen to me as I tell you five reasons why sticking it to them by eloping after all is not that good an idea."

"Five reasons? You've just pulled five reasons out of your arse in the past thirty seconds," Ginny asked sceptically.

"Yes, I'm that good. Want to see? Well, here it goes: number one – I'm pretty sure you and Harry making a run for it would actually be good enough a twist to have them selling more newspapers and magazines; number two – if you elope, your family won't get to be there and you don't want that; number three – Ron has already eloped with Hermione last year so it would look like you're just stealing their idea; number four – Ron has already eloped with Hermione last year so you know how furious your mother was at the both of them; number five…"

"That one won't count if you say Ron has already eloped with Hermione last year, so something or other will happen again," Ginny stated.

"No. This one is actually about how I'm going to kill you if you make a run for it after all this wedding trouble."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "Trouble my arse. Don't think I don't know why you and Ron were so on board with me and Harry naming Hermione as your co-maid of honour and co-best man at the same time. You were planning to delegate everything on her, which I know you did."

"I most certainly did not. I spent over a week helping you decide which cake flavour was best because you and Harry had decided to have dinner at some tacky fish and chips place and caught food poisoning. I gained two pounds for you!" Izzy replied in outrage.

"Oh, I'm sorry. That must've been literally painful, eating cake for free," Ginny said sarcastically.

"It was when I had to go jogging every day for a month to lose them again," she stated just a moment before Ginny's old bedroom door burst open all of a sudden and closed itself back only seconds later with no one apparently entering the room in between. "What the…?" She didn't have to finish the question as, seconds later, Harry was removing his invisibility cloak from over himself. "Harry!" she said, her voice taking a more scolding tone than an excited one. "Get out! You're not supposed to see the bride before the wedding – it's bad luck!"

"Don't worry. I've made a deal with the universe – I'll forgive it for all the trouble it gave me during the first seventeen years of my life and in return it won't let anything muck this day up," he replied in an easy-going manner. "Besides, I think that only applies if she's wearing a wedding dress, which she's not."

"It's easier to make a run for it when you're not wearing a huge dress," Ginny replied with a devious smile.

Harry paled as Izzy just huffed, taking back the seat she'd been occupying before. "What?"

"Oh, don't worry. If went forward with it, I'd take you along," Ginny assured him.

"Well, you'd better not go forward with it because it is my job as maid-of-honour to kill you both if this wedding doesn't go through," Izzy informed them.

"I'm pretty sure it's not. And you know I could arrest you for that, right?" Harry said, taking a seat on Ginny's bed. "Threatening a law-enforcement officer is a crime."

Izzy grabbed one of Ginny's discarded slippers from the floor and threw it at him.

"Oh, looks like you can add battery to the mix," Ginny said, sitting by her soon-to-be-husband's side. "Battery is a big deal when the Saviour of the Wizarding World is concerned. Wasn't there a rumour that they added an extra life sentence to Yaxley because he tried to kill you while you were on a mission to capture him?"

"That was blown a little bit out of proportion. They were just deliberating between twelve and thirteen life sentences and the fact that he was a bloody menace during his capture was what swung them to the thirteen side," Harry explained. "To be fair, I'm pretty sure he only needed one of those."

"Who knows? Maybe he's planning to give you a run for your money and raise from the dead repeatedly," Izzy pointed out.

"How many times do I need to tell you that I did not raise from the dead?!" he said in annoyance. "Not… fully."

"Hum, hum," Izzy mumbled, sounding unconvinced. "Anyway, what are you doing here, challenging centuries of tradition by chatting up the bride right before the weeding?"

"I was bored of being on my own," he said.

"On your own? I thought Ron and Hermione were with you," Ginny said. "Hermione clearly said she was going to check up on you when she left this room like fifteen minutes ago."

"She did. But then when she was going through her third checklist, we realized Ron had forgotten the rings at their flat and he had to go back to get it. And since he's still physically paying for all the drinking he had last night, Hermione went along to make sure he wouldn't splinch himself on the way."

Ginny snorted, expecting nothing less of her brother. "I told you letting him hold on to the rings was a bad idea."

"You did, so I put a locator charm on them. If he lost them, I could always find them," Harry assured her. "But, anyway, what about the other bridesmaids? Aren't most brides supposed to be surrounded by them right before weddings?"

"Do I look like one of those brides to you?" Ginny asked in return in a rhetorical manner.

He chuckled. "You don't look like 'one of those' anything to me."

"Good answer," the redhead told him. "Anyway, Luna's being Luna and you know she's never on time for anything these days. As for Quinn, you know she's coming with Sirius and Mia. And, finally, Fleur is in labour, so I'm pretty sure she won't make it."

"Really?" Harry asked, surprised. "Ron and Hermione didn't mention it."

"Of course they didn't," she said. "Ron can't process anything in that big head of his when he's hung-over even if it was the fact that his clothes were on fire and Hermione is freaking out over every detail of this wedding."

"Do you think she may be vicariously living all the stresses of planning an actual wedding through you?" Izzy asked her best friend.

"It could be," Ginny offered. "If it is, it works for me. Anyway, Mum went over there to Shell Cottage to get Victoire and said the healer told her it should take a handful of hours for the baby to come. She's going to keep checking in before the ceremony and during the reception," the redhead explained, finishing just as a knock sounded on the door, causing Harry to start looking for his invisibility cloak so he could conceal himself under it again.

"_Ginny, sweetie, are you decent? Can Sirius and I come in?"_ Mia's voice asked through the door.

"Just a second!" she called back, helping her fiancé cover himself and backing him into a corner of the room as Izzy snickered unhelpfully on her chair. "Alright, you can come in now."

The door clicked open and Mia stepped in, followed by her husband. "Good morning, girls. Ready for the big day, Ginny?"

"As ready as I'll get," the redhead said. "I could do without the reporters surrounding the wards, though."

"Couldn't we all?" Sirius asked as he reached down to greet his oldest daughter with a kiss at the top of her head. "Hey, not to alarm anybody, but does any of you know what happened to Harry? I'm pretty sure it's not a runaway groom kind of situation, but we went to Ron's room and it was empty."

"Oh… er, maybe he went to the loo?" Ginny suggested in a rather unconvincing tone, her usual ability to lie under stress failing her for whatever reason. Maybe the fact that Harry was literally standing right behind her nearly breathing down her neck had something to do with it.

"Yeah, maybe he did," Izzy agreed in a very unhelpful fashion.

There was a moment of awkward silence.

"He's right here in this room with us, isn't he?" Sirius asked as soon as the moment was over.

Just like that, Ginny gave up on the pretence and pulled the cloak from over Harry without a warning.

"Hey! My glasses are stuck!" he complained as the cloak uncovered him, bringing his spectacles down with them. He managed to loosen them after a few seconds and put them back on his face, standing there looking at his godparents from behind Ginny. "Hum… hi?"

Mia sighed. "Why am I not even surprised?"

"Does that mean you're not going to yell at me?" he asked, tentatively.

"Why would she? We saw plenty of each other right before our own wedding," Sirius pointed out before his face turned thoughtful.

"Sirius!" Mia said in a scolding manner.

"What?" he asked, genuinely surprised his sentence granted him a scolding. Then, it hit him. "Oh, I didn't mean that in a dirty way! Honestly, why does everyone have to assume I'm always saying something filthy?"

"It's just something on your face, Dad," his daughter pointed out.

"Don't make me ground you, Isabelle. Just because you have a job and a flat of your own, you're not too old for that yet," Sirius warned her.

"_Anyway,"_ Mia said, rolling her eyes at her husband's threats. "We just came by to see if any of you needed anything. Maybe a pep talk or a hand getting ready…"

"Or a quick way out of here," Sirius jokingly offered, earning himself a smack on the side by his own daughter, which caused him to yelp and glare at her. "Oi! I'm the grownup here."

"That's debatable. And don't encourage them, Dad," Izzy told him.

"What? Is there something going on that we're not aware of?" he asked, turning to the couple. "Should we prepare ourselves to feast on a wedding reception without an actual wedding?"

Ginny chuckled, turning to look at Harry, who shrugged, as if saying it was up to her. "You know what? I think we're good," she told Sirius after a few seconds. "It would take us far longer to find somewhere to elope than just going through with things here. Plus, we wouldn't want you to have to find your way back into Azkaban just to visit your daughter because she was incarcerated for murdering us like she promised would if we didn't go through with this wedding." She gave Izzy a grin, which was responded to with a narrow-eyed look.

"I'd make it look like an accident," she assured her best friend.

"That never works," Harry casually informed her, as if they weren't discussing his potential murder at all.

"I'd make it work," Izzy replied.

Mia cleared her throat. "Do I need to give you all a time out? Here I was, a little overwhelmed that my two oldest children are all grown up, but apparently I must've been thinking of someone else's kids." To be fair, she had to admit that she was glad to see Harry and Izzy bicker – it just served to convince her that the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. It made her feel like smiling but, in order to remain faithful to the scolding moment she'd just had, she sighed instead. "Alright, then. Do any of you know where Molly is? I should see if she needs a hand with anything."

"She probably could but good luck finding her," Ginny said. "She's running around the place like a chicken with its head cut off, micro-managing every detail of everything. I thought I was the one who was supposed to be acting like a nutter today."

"Shall I refer you to the moment you were having about ten minutes ago?" Izzy asked. "Something to do with reporters and elopements…"

"Do you want to compare that to the way Fleur acted on her wedding day? She was so bonkers that Mum slipped pregnancy-detecting potion into her tea to check if it wasn't hormone-induced. Which, shockingly, it wasn't."

Sirius snorted. "I wish I was a fly on that wall."

"Trust me, you don't. The sound waves from her voice alone would have crushed you," Ginny assured him.

"Well, in any case, it's good to see that you're handling everything better. That both of you are," Mia added, turning to Harry. "Now, I should really go and find Molly. I'll come check on you both again before the ceremony, but if you need anything…"

"We'll open a window and call for you," Harry said. "We're fine. Now go and enjoy all the stress of being mother-of-the-groom for the day."

Something warmed up inside Mia upon hearing Harry calling her his mother. Calling her 'Mum' or 'his mother' wasn't something that naturally slipped out of his month. He'd tried shortly after the end of the war but it had all felt very… forced. It wasn't that he felt about her as anything less than his mother – he'd just spent such a long time calling her 'Aunt Mia' (a habit she'd encouraged as a way to never let him completely drift apart from the memory of Lily as his original mother) that the title 'Mum' had just sort of… mutated into it. He'd been rather frustrated upon realizing that at first, given that he'd made her a promise he'd start calling her 'Mum' if he made it though the war, but she'd quickly let him off the hook, though. At the end of it, she knew she'd never resent him but whenever one of those rare natural references of her as his mother slipped out of his mouth, it just felt like a little bit of heaven.

And, as the little bit of heaven it was, she couldn't help approaching Harry and enveloping him with a hug. "You've come such a long way," she whispered. "I hope you know how proud we are of you. And how proud Lily and James would be too."

"Thank you," was all he could say in response before she pulled away, moving on to hug Ginny as well and drop a few 'thank yous' to her as well.

"Alright, then, better be off," Mia said, heading to the door a few seconds later.

Sirius jumped in immediately. "Do you want me to…?"

"No need, you can stay. I'll see you later," she quickly dismissed him on her way out, her tone a little strangled.

"Was she starting to cry?" Harry asked, mildly alarmed at his godmother's exit.

"It's an emotional day," Sirius simply let him know. "Well, I'll get out of your hair too. Izzybel, come along – I need your help for something."

"What?"

"_Something_. Come on, I don't have all day," he said, grabbing her arm and pulling her up, all but dragging her behind him as he walked out.

Izzy only had the strength to hold on to the doorway long enough to give Harry a warning. "Don't you ruin her hair. It took like a half hour to do – if I have to explain to Molly why it needs to be done again, I'm throwing you under the bus."

"Nice to know," he replied dryly just before leaving her line of sight.

Once they were already on the stairs, making their way down, Izzy shot her father an inquisitive look. "So? What are we doing? I can't be too far – Ginny will need my help getting into her wedding dress."

"Don't worry. We're just going for a little walk. I won't take you too far," Sirius assured her.

Izzy narrowed her eyes at his response. "A walk? You wanted my help with _a walk_?"

"Er… I have a terrible sense of direction?" he replied, phrasing it more like a question.

"Bollocks. You could find your way out of a labyrinth blindfolded," she called him on it. "You just wanted to leave them alone, didn't you?"

"So what if I did? Pleasant as you are, I'm sure Harry didn't sneak into Ginny's room to enjoy your company."

"Funny how when Harry is concerned, you're all in to help him get a snog but when it's me, you're all shock and horror," she pointed out

"I don't know what you're talking about," he flat out lied.

She chuckled dryly. "I'll be sure to remind you of that later," she promised.

They reached the ground floor just in time to see Remus and Tonks walking into the house.

"Ah! There's my favourite Lupin!" Sirius said in a cheery tone.

Remus sighed. "I'm going to assume you don't mean me," he said.

"Or me," Tonks added, rolling her eyes.

"Well, now that you've finally given me the godchild I've been requesting for so long, I'm honour-bound to like her more than any of you," he said, just as Remus placed the portable bassinet on the sofa. He approached, peering into the bassinet only to find himself looking back at the sleepy ten-day-old baby girl inside. "Well, hello there, gorgeous. Remember me?"

The little girl just stared back with tired blue eyes before yawning and closing them, apparently ready to drift off to sleep.

"Looks like you haven't made much of an impression on her so far," Izzy told her father, who narrowed his eyes at her.

"I'll have you know I just have a very soothing presence," he replied before turning to Remus. "So, where's the little Marauder? The other one, I mean."

"Oh, already marauding about with your kids, as usual," his old friend replied. "By the way, is it true you gave Alex a free card to completely destroy his dress robes after he's done with pictures? Because he seems to believe you did."

"As long as he just gets them dirty and doesn't tear them apart, it's fair game," Sirius replied.

"Well, thanks, then, because Teddy wants in on the deal," Tonks pointed out. "I swear if he covers himself with mud head to toe, I'm sending him over for you to clean up."

"Go ahead. Cleaner is my middle name. Speaking of which, have you two settled on a name yet or do I have to keep referring to this little bundle of joy as 'the nameless little girl also known as my goddaughter'? Honestly, who takes over a week after their baby is born to decide on a name?"

"Oh, just stuff it, Sirius. Not everyone is instantly struck by naming inspiration the moment they lay eyes on the kid," Tonks pointed out. It had been the opposite on their case – they'd had a name picked out but, the moment they lay eyes on her, she just didn't look like a Caroline. "But, as a matter of fact, we did settle on a name just yesterday. Libby."

"Aw, that's a great name," Izzy said. "Hi, Libby," she said, tickling the little girl, who flailed her little limbs around in response.

"Wait a second," Sirius said, turning to Tonks. "Do you mean Libby as in short for… _Liberty_?"

Tonks narrowed her eyes. "So what if it is?" she challenged him.

"Oh, nothing other than the fact that it was one of the first names on my list of 'Cliché post-war names my godchild shall not have', right next to Freedom, Victory, Justice and other equally overused names ever since we won the war. Did you actually call your own child Liberty just to annoy me?"

"Well, you were just asking for it, weren't you? Besides, Liberty is a perfectly decent name," Tonks replied.

"I bet that's what your mother thought when she called you Nymphadora!" he said.

The metamorphagus looked at him in complete outrage. "At least 'Liberty' is something you can find in a dictionary!"

"Most decent names are _not _supposed to be found in dictionaries!"

"Well, fine – here's a suggestion: if you want naming rights so badly, why don't you go make another kid with your wife and leave me alone?"

"I can't! She won't let me!" he said in exasperation, to his daughter's mortification.

"Okay! I am going back from where I came from before I die of embarrassment," Izzy announced, positively horrified. "Thank you for that, by the way, Dad."

"Hey, she started it!" Sirius protested as his daughter made her way back up the stairs. The moment she was out of his side, he turned to the metamorphagus and glared. "Bad Tonks. And shame on you, Moony, for letting your nutter of a wife do such a thing to your own child," he added, turning to Remus. "Shame on you." And, just like that, he promptly walked out of the house, while mumbling something along the lines of 'bloody liberty' under his breath.

While Tonks just stood there looking positively delighted, her husband seemed completely dumbfounded.

"Okay, just to be sure… Libby still stands as short for Olivia, right?" Remus had to ask. "You didn't just decide to actually call her Liberty to annoy Sirius, I hope."

Tonks snorted. "Of course not. Liberty… honestly, do you have any idea how many Liberties she'll go to school with?" she pointed out. "Even though he was all annoying about it, Sirius did have a point when he said those names were lame and overused. Even Dawlish has twins named Liberty and Justice and they're _boys._"

"Merlin, those poor children…" her husband commented. "So, how long do you plan to keep on fooling Sirius?"

"As long as I can. Seriously – I'd trade a vital organ just for the chance of watching someone's bottled memory of his face when he found out through the sorting hat's roll call that Libby's actual name was Olivia rather than Liberty."

"A bit unlikely you'll keep it up that long. Honestly, knowing Sirius, he's just about to go vent about it to someone right now and they'll tell him he was fooled."

"Yeah… but one can hope."

While the couple hoped downstairs and Sirius fumed outside, Izzy made her way up the stairs, headed back to Ginny's room. It was around the time she reached the second floor that she stopped to think, considering for the first time the fact that Harry was still in the room. It was probably not a bad idea to give him and Ginny a little more time on their own, or else she risked walking into something she really didn't want to walk into. Even going near the room at that point was too much of a risk to her sanity, honestly.

She considered going back downstairs but, even before she could actually decide on it, something caught her attention. The twins' old room's door was open, something that very rarely happened (something she'd never personally witnessed) ever since Fred had passed away.

She couldn't resist taking a few steps closer and peering inside for a moment – once she did, her surprise only grew: George was inside. It was a widely known fact around those parts that there were certain things George had started religiously avoiding after Fred's death – things that would bring memories too painful to bear. With time, he'd gotten over most of those things, their childhood bedroom being the only one remained: he hadn't stepped foot in it since Fred's death. Not once. She knew it – everyone knew it. So, naturally, she couldn't help feeling slightly flabbergasted to see him in there.

As she watched him standing at the window with his back to her, apparently oblivious to her presence, she wondered if she should say something or just leave him be. She got too distracted debating, it appeared, as next thing she knew was George facing her with raised eyebrows.

"Are you planning to come on in at some point, Isabelle?" he asked.

She took her about five seconds to form a single word, so astounded she was. "I'm … er… You're here," she said.

"I am," he confirmed in a tone that silently pointed out how obvious her statement was.

"In this room," she added.

"No, I'm in the kitchen," he replied sarcastically.

"What?" she asked, completely missing it.

He sighed. "Never mind. Yes, I'm here. I'm in this room. You're not imagining it."

"I'm not imagining it," she repeated slowly, like she was testing it. A few seconds passed and she seemed about to say something before stopping herself, crossing her arms in restraint against her chest as she remained standing at the doorway.

"Go on," he encouraged her. "You can ask it."

"Ask what?" she asked, as if she didn't know.

"You know _what_," he told her. "And you really can come in, you know? This is not sacred ground that will be tainted with your presence." It occurred to him that it was a little ironic he'd say that – he'd avoided the place for such a long time…

She took a tentative step inside, then another. After a moment of silence, she spoke. "Are you sure you want me to ask it? Because this is a big thing for you. You're entitled to a little time before people start bombarding you with questions," she said. She was always careful not to push him with those matters now – matters concerning Fred. She'd learned her lesson from their confrontation on the day of the battle, all those years before. Even though it was long past them, she couldn't help being reminded of it every time Fred's memory was particularly present.

"You're not 'people'," he reminded her softly. "You know I learned the hard way not to put you in the same box as everyone else. So, ask."

Her lips curled slightly, fuelled by the memory that, despite harsh-sounding, was actually a rather good one. She sighed. "Why? Why did you come into this room today after all that time?"

"Because I like to keep my promises," he replied.

She raised her eyebrows at that. "What promises?"

"Just one promise," he said. "A very old one. Honestly, I'd forgotten all about it until it came up yesterday during Harry's stag do. We were all talking about the old times and at some point Ginny's old crush on Harry came up. You know the way she fancied him even before she met him in person – we used to tease her mercilessly about it when we were kids. And while we were talking yesterday, Ron reminded me of this one time when Fred and I told her that if she ever managed to snag Harry Potter, we'd give her our entire Chocolate-Frog Card collection. It was a big deal at the time – we were like ten and that collection was our most prized possession – so we were really were just taunting her. Anyway, it's stupid. She probably doesn't remember it at all."

"She'll still appreciate it," Izzy assured him. "Especially once she gets to rub on your face how wrong you and Fred were to bet your collection on her never snagging Harry."

He chuckled. "I've no doubt that will be the best part of all, as far as she's concerned."

"Like I said, she'll love it. So, I take it you came here to find the collection," she guessed.

He nodded, gesturing to an old box resting on top of the dresser. "We never ended up taking it along once we moved into our own flat… Anyway, I spent good part of this morning talking myself into coming here to fetch it. It's been four years. I've moved on with most of my life. It was time I moved on with this room too… and so I came here. And when I did, it felt… fine."

"Fine?" she asked, surprised.

"Yeah. Fine," he said, walking over to his old bed and sitting at the bottom of it. "I mean, it stung that it made me miss Fred like mad, I'll admit, but it wasn't unbearable. Not anymore." He knew that feeling would never really go away – missing Fred. Knowing that had torn him apart in the beginning but, with time, he'd learned to be able to live with it. To withstand it through letting people in rather than pushing them out. Through letting the good memories flow rather than holding on the bad ones. "Makes me feel kind of stupid that I avoided this place for so long like it was the root of all pain. It's just a room with a lot of memories."

"Hey, you took the time you needed to take," she told him, taking a seat by his side. "That's not stupid – it's giving yourself time to heal."

He turned to her. "Do you ever get tired of trying to defend me from myself, Isabelle?"

"Every once in a while. Thankfully, you don't give me much reason to intervene these days," she replied.

George smiled. He could always count on her to do that… to do pretty much anything. Either it was to yell at him or to offer him a shoulder to lean on, she was always there. And even though she was completely different from Fred, she'd come to occupy the role his twin brother had left vacant as his best friend. Well, she and Lee had, though he leaned more on the latter as a partner in crime and on Izzy as… well, as practically everything else.

"So, maid-of-honour, how is our bride doing today?" he asked. "Did she kick you out already?"

She shook her head. "I actually chose to leave. For all intents and purposes, she's having a moment on her own."

"For all intents and purposes?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "Is there any chance our favourite groom is tempting fate as we speak?"

"Something like that," she confirmed.

George had to chuckle. "Of course." He paused for a thoughtful moment. "Merlin, I can't believe Gin-Gin is getting married today."

"I can't believe Harry is either," she replied. "Feels like it was just a few days ago that he was pulling at my pigtails."

"Oh, he told us about that yesterday," George stated, making her raise an eyebrow. "Old-times talk, remember? A lot of stuff came up. Did you really throw a whole sac of flour at his face when you were a toddler?"

"It was accidental magic. I can't be blamed for what I did because of accidental magic," she said defensively. "What else did he say? Do I need to go upstairs and make him regret it?"

George chuckled. "Don't worry – your Dad took him home before he got drunk enough to reveal something really embarrassing."

"Good," she said, relieved. "Still, I hear it was an interesting party last night. Apparently Ron still can't quite stand upright yet."

"Well, that's his own fault for mixing Mead with Firewhiskey and Butterbeer and… something blue that I was unable to identify," George pointed out. "But that was actually the least exciting part of the night. The most exciting one involved Ron falling in the fountain in Trafalgar Square, Percy ralphing all over a constable's shoes, Bill explaining in excruciating detail the wonders pregnancy has on his wife's curves and, finally, me finding out that all the while Charlie was hooking up with someone he really shouldn't be hooking up with."

"Funny how you leave your own antics out of that account," Izzy pointed.

"I'll have you know, Miss Black, that the most embarrassing thing I did last night was laughing myself to tears," he assured her. "Staying just mildly tipsy in order to fully enjoy the crap the really drunk people you're with pull is terribly underrated."

"I take it you gathered a shocking amount of dirt on your brothers for a single night, then," she said with a chuckle.

"Better. I gathered very good, undeniably embarrassing, dirt on Charlie, which is very hard to do because, as you know, he has a very small shame spectrum."

"He does, and I'm pretty sure shagging some random girl isn't included in it," Izzy pointed out.

"It is when _this _girl is concerned," George told her.

Izzy immediately looked alarmed. "Bloody hell, is it a friend of ours? Is it Luna?"

"What? No. Of course not. Luna would never go for his type," he assured her.

"Then what? Is she married?"

"Nope – worse."

She looked at him in disbelief. "What's worse than married? Some bride he stole from a wedding?"

"_Even _worse." That time, she just gaped at him. She had absolutely no idea what he meant. "Allow me to direct you to the poster on that wall," he said, gesturing to the wall on her left where, about three feet away from the door, a large poster of the 1993 Holyhead Harpies team presented itself.

"A Harpy," Izzy realized.

"Not just any Harpy," George told her, pointing at the one waving at them on the centre of the poster. "_That _Harpy. The most legendary captain and beater of the Holyhead Harpies, three-time league champion, Quidditch hall-of famer and current much-prized coach to her previous team: the one and only… Gwenog Jones. Also known today as 'the Boss of the Bride'."

"No…" she mumbled, looking positively dumbfounded. "No way. You're lying."

"As if I'd ever have the nerve to feed you wrong information just to have your wrath fall on me like the hand of god," he casually told her. "Trust me. I was unfortunate enough to see happening in a dodgy London alley. My eyes are still burning."

"Oh my God," Izzy mumbled. "Oh my god, Charlie shagged Ginny's boss the day before her wedding."

"Oh, yes he did, the little tart," he said of his brother.

"But how? People don't just run into Gwenog Jones out of chance."

"I don't know – I remember seeing her earlier in the night entering that new fancy restaurant near Flourish and Blots with some bloke when I was heading to the Leaky Cauldron. She was probably on a date, but it must've gone sideways enough that she ended up drowning her sorrows in the Leaky too. It's no news Charlie will set his sights on a vulnerable female like a lion on a lone gazelle drinking from a pond," George argued.

"Even if said female is Gwenog Jones?"

"_Especially_ if that female is Gwenog Jones. He's been singing odes to her legs ever since he was a randy second year noticing girls for the first time and she was the Captain of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team. There literally were poems involved – bad ones. Fred and I stole a few of them… they're probably stashed in this room somewhere."

"Wait, so they knew each other from school?"

He gave her a doubtful look. "She was five years ahead and in a different house. I doubt they ever spoke to each other. Still, he could probably get a conversation starter out of that. Then a mention of Ginny… well, you can see where I'm going. Now, am I exaggerating it all in my mind or is that enough to get Gin-Gin to tear him a new one?"

"It's enough for her to do that and then feed him to one of his dragons," she replied. "But you're not going to tell her now, are you? Because she _will _lose it. And I'd rather she wasn't taken in for murder on her own wedding day."

"Of course not – I wouldn't waste it all in one go. I'm going to use this to torment him the way he torments me about Crazy Effie."

"Are you kidding me? This would wipe the floor with the Crazy Effie situation. You don't want to compare the wrath of Ginny Weasley to the wrath of Lee Jordan – not to mention that the Crazy Effie thing happened ages ago. But does Charlie know that you know?" she asked.

"Not yet. As a sign of good faith, I'm saving it for a less eventful day," he told her. "I wouldn't want to ruin the wedding. Especially when I'm counting on using the reception to collect the dance you've owed me since Bill's wedding. It's practically a scandal that I haven't taken care of it yet."

"It's not my fault we never really attended a wedding at the same time between now and then," she replied.

"Well, I suppose it's better late than never," he stated.

"Are you sure you don't want to let this debt slide for the sake of your feet? Because I still can't dance."

"I don't care. Are you trying to sneak your way out of this?"

"Maybe," she admitted. "You know, I'm pretty sure there has to be some kind of rule in the guidebook of relationships that says something along the lines of 'if your current girlfriend opposes you collecting a debt-dance from some random bridesmaid from five years ago who had a crush on you, you should do what she says'. And I'm fairly sure I could convince that girlfriend of yours to oppose."

"Oh, I've no doubt you'd succeed. But then again, I think that rule would only really apply if the current girlfriend and the bridesmaid from five years ago didn't happen to be the very same person," he pointed out.

She tried to look uninterested. "I'd like to see that in writing."

He rolled his eyes in amusement, deciding not to bother with the argument any further since there was no doubt in his mind that, one way or the other, he'd get her to the dance floor later that day. "You know, I haven't had the chance to tell you yet how nice you look in that bridesmaid dress." He got up and stretched his arm towards her, intending to pull her up as well so he could get a better look at her dress.

She smiled, taking his hand. "Well, that wasn't very hard to achieve, considering all you have to compare it with is that golden atrocity Fleur made me wear."

"The only atrocious thing about that dress was that I had to look at you in it all day and keep my thoughts to myself," he informed her, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her closer until they were close together.

She looked at him pointedly. "And what thoughts would those be?"

"It's hard to put them into words," he stated.

"Then don't. No one said anything about words," she easily replied.

He grinned, eager to take the invitation, and dove in to show her a little sample of those thoughts instead, starting by covering her lips with his.

She took the kiss with a smile on her lips, responding by cupping his face and parting her lips. They'd kissed maybe thousands of times already throughout the years they'd been together – hundreds, certainly –, still it never got old for her. She was always excited to find out how it would be like next time – Passionate? Sweet? Vulnerable? It was safe to say he was brilliant at it every way they spun it.

That time, it started out playful, but quickly moved on from there as the passionate factor took over, like he was trying to make up for his self-restraint from Bill and Fleur's wedding all those years ago. If only he'd know back then how badly she'd daydreamed of that…

They had to break apart for breath a few seconds later and, once they did, standing pressed against one another, his forehead resting against hers, she spoke. "I wish you hadn't."

"What?"

"Kept your thoughts to yourself," she pointed out. "I was already falling for you back at the wedding."

"I didn't know that at the time," he retorted. "In my defence, I did plant one on you next time I saw you. At platform 9 ¾."

He really had, she fondly recalled it with a smile. "Pity you called it 'stupid'," she pointed out.

"I was stupid. The kiss was brilliant." As if to make a point, he leaned down and placed a soft one on her lips. "They always are."

Izzy was just about to kiss him again when Ginny's voice filled the room, causing the two of them to jump away from each other so their eyes could search for her in the room. However, instead of an amused redhead, they found themselves staring at a massive horse-shaped Patronus.

"_Izzy, can you come back up? I need your help with the dress," _it said in Ginny's voice before starting to fade away.

Izzy sighed. "Well, I guess that's my cue to go," she declared, sounding rather disappointed.

"Yeah, it's probably not a good idea to keep the bride waiting," he agreed with a sigh. "Besides, I can't let you monopolize all my time when I have another pretty, one-eight veela, girl waiting for me downstairs," he said, baiting her.

"I might be jealous if she wasn't two years old," Izzy pointed out, referring to his only niece and goddaughter. "Are you taking her to the pond?"

He nodded. "You know Vic. She thinks her duckies will starve if she doesn't feed them every time she comes by. Better be extra careful so she doesn't fall into the water, though. Fleur would never forgive me if I let her get dirty before the wedding."

"Oh, haven't you heard? Fleur isn't coming – she's in labour."

"Really?" he asked in surprise, before starting to grin. "Wow, Bill must be having the greatest time – a hangover _and_ a screaming wife. The perfect combination."

Izzy hit him on the arm. "Don't rejoice at your brother's misery," she scolded. "Now," she added, reaching forward to place a quick kiss on his lips, "I'm off."

Before she could step back, he pulled her into another, much deeper, kiss that made her let out a surprised moan against his lips. "Don't think I'll forget about that dance," he assured her.

"I wish you would," she replied.

"Yeah, well, you can't always get what you want, Miss Black."

The wedding ceremony went smoothly, culminating, as expected, into Harry and Ginny exchanging vows and becoming husband and wife.

Soon afterwards, the reception followed as a lively and casual affair. There was toasting, eating, cheering and chatting. Large groups of old friends and acquaintances that usually only got together once a year for the final-battle memorial gathered, standing in circles all over the marquee or sitting at the various tables. As the adults chatted away, children ran all over the place, taking turns between playing hide and seek and just plain running around after each other, not once showing sign of ever getting tired.

"So, kid, how does it feel like to finally be Mr Ginny Weasley?" Sirius asked his godson as the two of them finally managed to sit together on their own at one of the tables, about four and a half hours into the reception.

Harry grinned. "It may be too early to tell, but so far, so good," he said.

"Well, the shackles are on, kid. Get ready for all the fun to begin," Sirius told him. "And by fun, I don't mean always literal fun."

"I know, marriage takes work, yada, yada… Aunt Mia's already sat me down for that. And Molly. And Arthur. Even Tonks lectured me about it one day she was particularly annoyed at Remus and all men in general because he'd 'insulted' her by insisting that she didn't move heavy stuff around while eight and a half months pregnant. A bit awkward to have your boss telling you in excruciating detail what not to do when you're married in a middle of a hormonal rant," Harry mumbled.

"Oh, well, at least you know what you're on to," his godfather offered. "But you picked a good one, kid. The mighty Ginny."

Harry snorted. "She'd love to hear that."

"Well, save it for a stormy day, then. You can never be wrong when you have a couple of interesting compliments up your sleeve," Sirius advised him, just as they heard his godson's name being called from somewhere in the room.

They turned to the source and found Ginny at the tent's entrance, surrounded by her parents, Charlie and George, the latter of whom seemed to be carrying little Victoire. She seemed to be gesturing at Harry to come join them for something.

"Go on, kid. You're being summoned – get used to it," Sirius told him.

"Already am," Harry said as he got up and walked away towards his new wife.

Sirius watched as Ginny told his godson something that made him grin. Then, George kissed his niece goodbye, handed her over to Ginny, and walked back into the tent as the rest of them walked out. Wondering what they were up to, he didn't skip on the chance to grill his daughter's boyfriend. "Oi, lover boy!" he called, prompting the younger boy to approach. "What was that all about?"

"Fleur's just had the baby. Mum is taking them to meet it now so Harry and Ginny can leave for the honeymoon on time."

"Really? So, what's the verdict? Did I win anything in the betting pool?" Sirius asked.

"I don't think so. It was another girl. Pretty much everyone was betting on a boy. But let me check the rest," he said, reaching into his pocket for a piece of parchment where they'd all written their bets just the week before. "Alright," he mumbled as he looked through the names. "Ah, here it is. Sirius Black – boy, twenty-one inches, eleven pounds…" He paused, raising his eyebrows. "Eleven pounds? Really? Did you see Fleur's size? How on Earth would she possibly hide an eleven pound baby in that little bump of hers?"

"I dunno. Bumps can be misleading," Sirius replied.

"Not _that _misleading," he said with a laugh.

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "You know I can withdraw my permission for you to date my daughter at any time, right?"

"_Sirius, don't threaten your daughter's boyfriend_," they heard Mia saying before even spotting her approaching them from behind. "Didn't we talk about this in the past?" she asked.

"It's not my fault he's being a smartarse," Sirius grumbled, looking down like a little kid who'd just been scolded by his mother. "Fleur's just had her baby and I've just lost two galleons."

Mia sighed. "Why do you still bother to bet on these things? You know you're terrible at it," she said.

"I am not!"

"Really? When Elizabeth and Kingsley were adopting Diana, you guessed they'd get an eight-pound boy even though they'd said they were going for a war orphan and it was months after the war was over."

"I didn't hear the war orphan part. They must've said it while I was in the loo," he defended himself. "Besides, I wasn't too far about Moony's little girl. Tell her, George."

"He was actually pretty close," the younger man confirmed, even though they both knew the only thing he'd guessed right about Libby Lupin was that she'd be a girl. "Well, if you don't mind, I'd better go tell Ron he's won himself twelve galleons."

"Tell him not to spend it all in one place," Sirius replied.

"He might have to. From the looks of it, he'd going to need plenty of hangover potion from the apothecary," George informed him with a chuckle before walking away.

He reached Ron a few seconds later, finding him in a pitiful state, sitting at a table with his face down on the table cloth.

"Aren't you a sight for sore eyes?" he told his brother as he sat by his side, getting an unintelligible grunt as his only response. "Congratulations, you won the bet. We've got a new niece. You got everything right but the height."

His response was another grunt.

"So, has Hermione dumped you for a less hung over bloke?"

Another grunt.

"You know, you're going to have to start speaking English. I don't understand pitiful sod language," George informed him.

Ron groaned, finally lifting his head up. "I said 'no'. She went to check if Harry and Ginny had everything packed," he said in a very scratchy tone.

"Of course she did," George replied, recognizing his sister-in-law's micromanaging ways. "Anyway, you look like death. How many of me do you see?"

"Not sure. More than one, for sure," his brother replied.

George looked over his shoulder and sighed. "Pity you're hung over, then," he mumbled.

Even with a skull-splitting headache, Ron could recognize the hint of sadness in his brother's voice. "Go on. Mock me some more," he honestly urged him. "You can have Fred's share too if it makes you feel better."

George shook his head. "I'm fine. Besides, it's too easy. You can only beat a dead horse so much before is stops being funny. Better quit when I'm on top."

Ron sighed. "Good for me, I guess," he mumbled, going back to resting face-down on the table just as Izzy made her way to their table.

"Hey, where has Ginny gone?" she asked, taking a seat by George's side. "I just stepped out for a few minutes to go to the loo."

"She and Harry went to meet Bill's new baby," her boyfriend informed her. "It's another girl, apparently. Very un-Weasley-like."

She chuckled. "I hope you're not implying anything about your mother."

"Merlin, no," he said, immediately, before quickly changing the subject. "So, it seems you have a break on your maid-of-honour duties. I guess it's time we settled that old debt…"

She groaned. "Do we have to? You know, Ron doesn't look too good. Maybe we should stay here and make sure he doesn't choke on his own vomit or something."

Ron lifted his head. "Thanks," he said dryly. "And, by all means, don't let me stop you from whatever you need to do."

"See? He's fine," George said.

"But I'm exhausted."

"Not enough to escape that dance you owe me, you're not. It is your duty as my girlfriend to dance with me at least once tonight," he said, getting up and stretching his arm to her

She groaned. "Do I have to? This makes it even more likely that I'll end up falling face-first on the floor."

"I promise I'll hold you up," he calmly assured her.

She just looked at him for a few moments before sighing and taking his hand, letting him pull her up. "You'd better know this makes me a brilliant girlfriend and that this gives me the right to dismember you ever dump me for thinking otherwise."

"Good thing I'm not planning to dump you," he pointed out, already walking her to the dance.

"Don't you dare try anything fancy," she threatened him. "If you spin me, you'll regret it."

"Hmm-hmm," he mumbled in response.

"I mean it," she insisted.

He sighed. "Isabelle, you don't spin people to Seraphina Warbeck," he assured her, referring to Celestina's mellower-sounding sister, whose last single's first chords seemed to be sounding on the background. "Now, will you shut up and just put your arms around me?"

She did as she was told and, after a few awkward moments of trying to figure where each hand went and to which side each of them was supposed to move so they wouldn't step on each other's toes over and over again, they managed to achieve some sort of simplistic rhythm. It was actually more comfortable than she'd predicted, like they were sharing a slightly weird, moving hug.

"So, are you going to miss having Ginny around?" he asked at some point, as they slowly moved around.

"Just because she and Harry got married, it doesn't mean she won't be around," Izzy replied.

"I know, but she'll no longer be your flatmate," he pointed put. "You can kiss her surprisingly brilliant cooking skills goodbye."

Izzy sighed – they _were _surprisingly brilliant cooking skills. "I suppose I'll have to live with my marginally acceptable ones instead," she admitted. "But then again, I already have to during half the Quidditch season – Gwenog Jones keeps dragging her to those training retreats…"

"Well, that's Charlie's girlfriend for you," George joked.

Izzy snorted. "I'd better be there when you tell that to his face."

"I'll plan it accordingly," he promised, just as the song changed to a softer tune that required an even slower dance.

He pulled her closer together, if that was even possible, and she rested her head against his shoulder as they moved slowly. George could tell she really was tired as she leaned heavily against him with her eyes closed, almost like she was trying to use the song to lull herself to sleep in his arms. He didn't mind it, though, reaching down with his lips to place a kiss at the top of her head.

"Do you want to come over after this?" she asked him softly, feeling his lips curl against the top of her head.

"You know I always do," he replied easily.

She smiled. "Do you want to stay?"

"For the night?"

"Forever," she replied.

He tensed against her for a second. "Is that an official request for me to move in or just a ramble from your wedding-stricken mind?"

"An official request," she replied, pulling away just enough so she could look up at him – he seemed cautiously hopeful. "I've been thinking of it for a few weeks. We've been together for quite a long time and you've been spending over half of your time in my flat ever since Ginny and I move into it. Honestly, even when she was around, it felt lonely when you weren't there. And now I have the flat all to myself and… well, I don't want to, I want you there. I mean…"

"Okay," he said before she could finish.

She paused and stared for a moment. "Okay? Really?"

"Really," he agreed.

"No fight about trying to get _me _to move into _your_ flat?"

"Well, considering that these days my flat is more like an extension of the shop's storage room where I just happen to live, that's probably not very practical. Besides, odds are, your cat would throttle me with its tail in my sleep if I made it move out."

"So, that's it? You're moving in? Just like that?"

"Just like that," he declared. "And, hey, now that Ginny's room is free, do you think I could use it for product experiments?"

"Don't you dare," she threatened.

"Come on. I promise I'll try to keep fires to a minimum," he insisted.

That time, she just glared. Once she saw his face break into a revealing grin, she smacked him on the arm. "You were winding me up!"

"Of course I was winding you up! I've got a perfectly good lab at the shop – why would I need another?"

"You're an arse," she declared.

"And yet you still love me enough to want to put up with me more than you usually do," he replied.

"There must be something wrong with me," she replied dryly.

He grinned at her subtle admission. "That's okay. I still love you too despite it," he told her before leaning forward to place a soft kiss on her lips.

Across the room, watching the couple as he sat at his table, Sirius groaned. "Ugh… do they really have to do that in public?" he mumbled.

Mia elbowed him softly on the ribs. "Leave them be – they're doing nothing wrong… certainly nothing that we haven't done before. And you should be used to it by now – they've been together for years."

Sirius groaned again, annoyed that his wife had a point – somehow that only made it worse. "Do you reckon they're up next?" he asked, although he really didn't want to hear the answer.

"Up for what?" his wife asked.

"We're at a wedding, Mia. Take a wild guess," he offered.

She did and sighed. "Maybe. Probably not, since Percy's already engaged and they aren't. But it's going to happen sooner or later. They're young and in love, Sirius. They're happy together," she told him calmly.

He groaned once more. "Can't you go back to being a mother hen all worked up about letting her chicks leave the nest like before? I think I'd feel better if you did. "

She smiled. "I don't think so. I guessed you did too much of a good job talking me out of it."

He huffed. "Why couldn't I just be quiet?" he mumbled.

She rested her hand on top of his. "They have a life ahead of them. Everyone does now. All that matters is living it the way it makes them happiest. Merlin knows we do."

Sirius looked thoughtful for a moment. "I guess you've got a point there," he offered, sighing as he looked away from the couple and back at her. "It took us a whole lot of trouble to get to this point, didn't it?"

She nodded. "Two wars, losing Lily and James, you spending twelve years in prison in the meanwhile…"

"Harry being right at the centre of one of those wars," he added. "Me being fired from Hogwarts and you having to go back there without me to protect Izzy, then you being nearly captured and us going into hiding…" He took a breath. "Do you ever wish it was easier?"

She shook her head. "Never. You know what they say – even if you change the littlest thing in the past, you might destroy the present as you know it. And I like the present. The fact that I know we had to fight to get it makes it even greater to enjoy – so, no, I wouldn't risk it for the world."

Sirius grinned. "Good answer," he told her. "Just imagine what a tragedy it would be if things has been different and you'd ended up married to Lucius Malfoy."

"Lucius Malfoy? Couldn't think of an even nicer imaginary husband for me?" she asked sarcastically.

"I'm talking worst-case scenario here. I promise if you somehow ended up stuck with Malfoy, I wouldn't rest until I'd freed you."

"How can you be so sure of that? Maybe in that world we hated each other. Or maybe we didn't know each other at all," she suggested.

Sirius frowned. "I don't like that world one bit."

"Well, then I guess we'd better stick to ours, then," she told him.

"Good idea. Now that this is settled, Mrs _Black_, kiss me and show me just how worth the trouble this world was," he requested with a smile.

"The way I'd never kiss Lucius Malfoy?" she asked.

"The way you'd never kiss anyone else at all," he corrected.

She chuckled and leaned forward, cupping his face and placing a soft kiss on his lips, chaste enough not to embarrass anyone who might spot them. When she pulled back, she gave him an inquisitive look. "Well?"

He gave her a wide grin. "Yep. Definitely worth every trouble."

**A/N: You can find the sequel to this fic in my profile. It's name is States of Mind and it focuses mostly on Izzy and George. It won't be as action-filled as this one or the previous as it focuses more on healing, romance and normalcy. Feel free to check it.**

**And, as always, Feedback is very welcome. Review!**


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